PART III

WHEREIN IT IS SHOWN THAT THE MOST ARDENT SPIRITS ARE MORE

ORNAMENTAL THAN USEFUL

Many a speculating wight

Came by express-trains, day and night,

To see if Knott would 'sell his right,' 550

Meaning to make the ghosts a sight--

What they call a 'meenaygerie;'

One threatened, if he would not 'trade,'

His run of custom to invade,

(He could not these sharp folks persuade

That he was not, in some way, paid,)

And stamp him as a plagiary,

By coming down, at one fell swoop,

With THE ORIGINAL KNOCKING TROUPE,

Come recently from Hades, 560

Who (for a quarter-dollar heard)

Would ne'er rap out a hasty word

Whence any blame might be incurred

From the most fastidious ladies;

The late lamented Jesse Soule,

To stir the ghosts up with a pole

And be director of the whole,

Who was engaged the rather

For the rare merits he'd combine,

Having been in the spirit line, 570

Which trade he only did resign,

With general applause, to shine,

Awful in mail of cotton fine,

As ghost of Hamlet's father!

Another a fair plan reveals

Never yet hit on, which, he feels,

To Knott's religious sense appeals--

'We'll have your house set up on wheels,

A speculation pious;

For music, we can shortly find 580

A barrel-organ that will grind

Psalm-tunes--an instrument designed

For the New England tour--refined

From secular drosses, and inclined

To an unworldly turn, (combined

With no sectarian bias;)

Then, travelling by stages slow,

Under the style of Knott & Co.,

I would accompany the show

As moral lecturer, the foe 590

Of Rationalism; while you could throw

The rappings in, and make them go

Strict Puritan principles, you know,

(How _do_ you make 'em? with your toe?)

And the receipts which thence might flow,

We could divide between us;

Still more attractions to combine,

Beside these services of mine,

I will throw in a very fine

(It would do nicely for a sign) 600

Original Titian's Venus.'

Another offered handsome fees

If Knott would get Demosthenes

(Nay, his mere knuckles, for more ease)

To rap a few short sentences;

Or if, for want of proper keys,

His Greek might make confusion,

Then just to get a rap from Burke,

To recommend a little work

On Public Elocution. 610

Meanwhile, the spirits made replies

To all the reverent _whats_ and _whys_,

Resolving doubts of every size,

And giving seekers grave and wise,

Who came to know their destinies,

A rap-turous reception;

When unbelievers void of grace

Came to investigate the place,

(Creatures of Sadducistic race,

With grovelling intellects and base,) 620

They could not find the slightest trace

To indicate deception;

Indeed, it is declared by some

That spirits (of this sort) are glum,

Almost, or wholly, deaf and dumb,

And (out of self-respect) quite mum

To skeptic natures cold and numb

Who of _this_ kind of Kingdom Come

Have not a just conception:

True, there were people who demurred 630

That, though the raps no doubt were heard

Both under them and o'er them,

Yet, somehow, when a search they made,

They found Miss Jenny sore afraid,

Or Jenny's lover, Doctor Slade,

Equally awestruck and dismayed,

Or Deborah, the chambermaid,

Whose terrors not to be gainsaid

In laughs hysteric were displayed,

Was always there before them;

This had its due effect with some

Who straight departed, muttering, Hum! 642

Transparent hoax! and Gammon!

But these were few: believing souls,

Came, day by day, in larger shoals,

As the ancients to the windy holes

'Neath Delphi's tripod brought their doles,

Or to the shrine of Ammon.

The spirits seemed exceeding tame,

Call whom you fancied, and he came; 650

The shades august of eldest fame

You summoned with an awful ease;

As grosser spirits gurgled out

From chair and table with a spout,

In Auerbach's cellar once, to flout

The senses of the rabble rout,

Where'er the gimlet twirled about

Of cunning Mephistopheles,

So did these spirits seem in store,

Behind the wainscot or the door,

Ready to thrill the being's core

Of every enterprising bore 662

With their astounding glamour;

Whatever ghost one wished to hear,

By strange coincidence, was near

To make the past or future clear

(Sometimes in shocking grammar)

By raps and taps, now there, now here--

It seemed as if the spirit queer

Of some departed auctioneer 670

Were doomed to practise by the year

With the spirit of his hammer:

Whate'er you asked was answered, yet

One could not very deeply get

Into the obliging spirits' debt,

Because they used the alphabet

In all communications,

And new revealings (though sublime)

Rapped out, one letter at a time,

With boggles, hesitations, 680

Stoppings, beginnings o'er again,

And getting matters into train,

Could hardly overload the brain

With too excessive rations,

Since just to ask _if two and two

Really make four? or, How d' ye do_?

And get the fit replies thereto

In the tramundane rat-tat-too,

Might ask a whole day's patience.

'Twas strange ('mongst other things) to find 690

In what odd sets the ghosts combined,

Happy forthwith to thump any

Piece of intelligence inspired,

The truth whereof had been inquired

By some one of the company;

For instance, Fielding, Mirabeau,

Orator Henley, Cicero,

Paley, John Ziska, Marivaux,

Melancthon, Robertson, Junot, 699

Scaliger, Chesterfield, Rousseau,

Hakluyt, Boccaccio, South, De Foe,

Diaz, Josephus, Richard Roe,

Odin, Arminius, Charles _le gros_,

Tiresias, the late James Crow,

Casabianca, Grose, Prideaux,

Old Grimes, Young Norval, Swift, Brissot,

Malmonides, the Chevalier D'O,

Socrates, Fénelon, Job, Stow.

The inventor of _Elixir pro_,

Euripides, Spinoza, Poe, 710

Confucius, Hiram Smith, and Fo,

Came (as it seemed, somewhat _de trop_)

With a disembodied Esquimaux,

To say that it was so and so,

With Franklin's expedition;

One testified to ice and snow,

One that the mercury was low,

One that his progress was quite slow,

One that he much desired to go,

One that the cook had frozen his toe, 720

(Dissented from by Dandolo,

Wordsworth, Cynaegirus, Boileau,

La Hontan, and Sir Thomas Roe,)

One saw twelve white bears in a row,

One saw eleven and a crow,

With other things we could not know

(Of great statistic value, though,)

By our mere mortal vision.

Sometimes the spirits made mistakes,

And seemed to play at ducks and drakes. 730

With bold inquiry's heaviest stakes

In science or in mystery:

They knew so little (and that wrong)

Yet rapped it out so bold and strong,

One would have said the unnumbered throng

Had been Professors of History;

What made it odder was, that those

Who, you would naturally suppose,

Could solve a question, if they chose,

As easily as count their toes, 740

Were just the ones that blundered;

One day, Ulysses happening down,

A reader of Sir Thomas Browne

And who (with him) had wondered

What song it was the Sirens sang,

Asked the shrewd Ithacan--_bang! bang!_

With this response the chamber rang,

'I guess it was Old Hundred.'

And Franklin, being asked to name

The reason why the lightning came, 750

Replied, 'Because it thundered.'

On one sole point the ghosts agreed

One fearful point, than which, indeed,

Nothing could seem absurder;

Poor Colonel Jones they all abused

And finally downright accused

The poor old man of murder;

'Twas thus; by dreadful raps was shown

Some spirit's longing to make known

A bloody fact, which he alone 760

Was privy to, (such ghosts more prone

In Earth's affairs to meddle are;)

_Who are you?_ with awe-stricken looks,

All ask: his airy knuckles he crooks,

And raps, 'I _was_ Eliab Snooks,

That used to be a pedler;

Some on ye still are on my books!'

Whereat, to inconspicuous nooks,

(More fearing this than common spooks)

Shrank each indebted meddler;

Further the vengeful ghost declared 771

That while his earthly life was spared,

About the country he had fared,

A duly licensed follower

Of that much-wandering trade that wins

Slow profit from the sale of tins

And various kinds of hollow-ware;

That Colonel Jones enticed him in,

Pretending that he wanted tin,

There slew him with a rolling-pin,

Hid him in a potato-bin, 781

And (the same night) him ferried

Across Great Pond to t'other shore,

And there, on land of Widow Moore,

Just where you turn to Larkin's store,

Under a rock him buried;

Some friends (who happened to be by)

He called upon to testify

That what he said was not a lie,

And that he did not stir this 790

Foul matter, out of any spite

But from a simple love of right;--

Which statements the Nine Worthies,

Rabbi Akiba, Charlemagne,

Seth, Golley Gibber, General Wayne,

Cambyses, Tasso, Tubal-Cain,

The owner of a castle in Spain,

Jehanghire, and the Widow of Nain,

(The friends aforesaid,) made more plain

And by loud raps attested; 800

To the same purport testified

Plato, John Wilkes, and Colonel Pride

Who knew said Snooks before he died,

Had in his wares invested,

Thought him entitled to belief

And freely could concur, in brief,

In everything the rest did.

Eliab this occasion seized,

(Distinctly here the spirit sneezed,)

To say that he should ne'er be eased 810

Till Jenny married whom she pleased,

Free from all checks and urgin's,

(This spirit dropt his final g's)

And that, unless Knott quickly sees

This done, the spirits to appease,

They would come back his life to tease,

As thick as mites in ancient cheese,

And let his house on an endless lease

To the ghosts (terrific rappers these

And veritable Eumenides) 820

Of the Eleven Thousand Virgins!

Knott was perplexed and shook his head,

He did not wish his child to wed

With a suspected murderer,

(For, true or false, the rumor spread,)

But as for this roiled life he led,

'It would not answer,' so he said,

'To have it go no furderer.'

At last, scarce knowing what it meant,

Reluctantly he gave consent 830

That Jenny, since 'twas evident

That she _would_ follow her own bent,

Should make her own election;

For that appeared the only way

These frightful noises to allay

Which had already turned him gray

And plunged him in dejection.

Accordingly, this artless maid

Her father's ordinance obeyed, 839

And, all in whitest crape arrayed,

(Miss Pulsifer the dresses made

And wishes here the fact displayed

That she still carries on the trade,

The third door south from Bagg's Arcade,)

A very faint 'I do' essayed

And gave her hand to Hiram Slade,

From which time forth, the ghosts were laid,

And ne'er gave trouble after;

But the Selectmen, be it known,

Dug underneath the aforesaid stone, 850

Where the poor pedler's corpse was thrown,

And found thereunder a jaw-bone,

Though, when the crowner sat thereon,

He nothing hatched, except alone

Successive broods of laughter;

It was a frail and dingy thing,

In which a grinder or two did cling,

In color like molasses,

Which surgeons, called from far and wide.

Upon the horror to decide, 860

Having put on their glasses,

Reported thus: 'To judge by looks,

These bones, by some queer hooks or crooks,

May have belonged to Mr. Snooks,

But, as men deepest read in books

Are perfectly aware, bones,

If buried fifty years or so,

Lose their identity and grow

From human bones to bare bones.'

Still, if to Jaalam you go down,

You'll find two parties in the town, 871

One headed by Benaiah Brown,

And one by Perez Tinkham;

The first believe the ghosts all through

And vow that they shall never rue

The happy chance by which they knew

That people in Jupiter are blue,

And very fond of Irish stew,

Two curious facts which Prince Lee Boo 879

Rapped clearly to a chosen few--

Whereas the others think 'em

A trick got up by Doctor Slade

With Deborah the chambermaid

And that sly cretur Jinny.

That all the revelations wise,

At which the Brownites made big eyes,

Might have been given by Jared Keyes,

A natural fool and ninny,

And, last week, didn't Eliab Snooks

Come back with never better looks, 890

As sharp as new-bought mackerel hooks,

And bright as a new pin, eh?

Good Parson Wilbur, too, avers

(Though to be mixed in parish stirs

Is worse than handling chestnut-burrs)

That no case to his mind occurs

Where spirits ever did converse,

Save in a kind of guttural Erse,

(So say the best authorities;)

And that a charge by raps conveyed 900

Should be most scrupulously weighed

And searched into, before it is

Made public, since it may give pain

That cannot soon be cured again,

And one word may infix a stain

Which ten cannot gloss over,

Though speaking for his private part,

He is rejoiced with all his heart

Miss Knott missed not her lover.

FRAGMENTS OF AN UNFINISHED POEM

I am a man of forty, sirs, a native of East Haddam,

And have some reason to surmise that I descend from Adam;

But what's my pedigree to you? That I will soon unravel;

I've sucked my Haddam-Eden dry, therefore desire to travel,

And, as a natural consequence, presume I needn't say,

I wish to write some letters home and have those letters p----

[I spare the word suggestive of those grim Next Morns that mount

_Clump, Clump_, the stairways of the brain with--'_Sir, my small

account_,'

And, after every good we gain--Love, Fame, Wealth, Wisdom--still,

As punctual as a cuckoo clock, hold up their little bill, 10

The _garçons_ in our Café of Life, by dreaming us forgot--

Sitting, like Homer's heroes, full and musing God knows what,--

Till they say, bowing, _S'il vous plait, voila, Messieurs, la note!_]

I would not hint at this so soon, but in our callous day,

The Tollman Debt, who drops his bar across the world's highway,

Great Cæsar in mid-march would stop, if Cæsar could not pay;

Pilgriming's dearer than it was: men cannot travel now

Scot-free from Dan to Beersheba upon a simple vow;

Nay, as long back as Bess's time,--when Walsingham went over

Ambassador to Cousin France, at Canterbury and Dover 20

He was so fleeced by innkeepers that, ere he quitted land,

He wrote to the Prime Minister to take the knaves in hand.

If I with staff and scallop-shell should try my way to win,

Would Bonifaces quarrel as to who should take me in?

Or would my pilgrim's progress end where Bunyan started his on,

And my grand tour be round and round the backyard of a prison?

I give you here a saying deep and therefore, haply true;

'Tis out of Merlin's prophecies, but quite as good as new:

The question boath for men and meates longe voyages yt beginne

Lyes in a notshell, rather saye lyes in a case of tinne. 20

But, though men may not travel now, as in the Middle Ages,

With self-sustaining retinues of little gilt-edged pages,

Yet one may manage pleasantly, where'er he likes to roam,

By sending his small pages (at so much per small page) home;

And if a staff and scallop-shell won't serve so well as then,

Our outlay is about as small--just paper, ink, and pen.

Be thankful! Humbugs never die, more than the wandering Jew;

Bankrupt, they publish their own deaths, slink for a while from view,

Then take an _alias_, change the sign, and the old trade renew;

Indeed, 'tis wondrous how each Age, though laughing at the Past, 40

Insists on having its tight shoe made on the same old last;

How it is sure its system would break up at once without

The bunion which it _will_ believe hereditary gout;

How it takes all its swans for geese, nay, stranger yet and sadder,

Sees in its treadmill's fruitless jog a heavenward Jacob's-ladder,

Shouts, _Lo, the Shining Heights are reached! One moment, more aspire!_

Trots into cramps its poor, dear legs, gets never an inch the higher,

And like the others, ends with pipe and mug beside the fire.

There, 'tween each doze, it whiffs and sips and watches with a sneer

The green recruits that trudge and sweat where it had swinked

whilere, 50

And sighs to think this soon spent zeal should be in simple truth,

The only interval between old Fogyhood and Youth:

'Well,' thus it muses, 'well, what odds? 'Tis not for us to warn;

'Twill be the same when we are dead, and was ere we were born;

Without the Treadmill, too, how grind our store of winter's corn?

Had we no stock, nor twelve per cent received from Treadmill shares,

We might ... but these poor devils at last will get our easy chairs.

High aims and hopes have great rewards, they, too, serene and snug,

Shall one day have their soothing pipe and their enlivening mug;

From Adam, empty-handed Youth hath always heard the hum 60

Of Good Times Coming, and will hear until the last day come;

Young ears Hear forward, old ones back, and, while the earth rolls on,

Full-handed Eld shall hear recede the steps of Good Times Gone;

Ah what a cackle we set up whene'er an egg was laid!

_Cack-cack-cack-cackle!_ rang around, the scratch for worms was stayed,

_Cut-cut-ca-dah-cut!_ from _this_ egg the coming cock shall stalk!

The great New Era dawns, the age of Deeds and not of Talk!

And every stupid hen of us hugged close his egg of chalk,

Thought,--sure, I feel life stir within, each day with greater strength,

When lo, the chick! from former chicks he differed not a jot, 70

But grew and crew and scratched and went, like those before, to pot!'

So muse the dim _Emeriti_, and, mournful though it be,

I must confess a kindred thought hath sometimes come to me,

Who, though but just of forty turned, have heard the rumorous fame

Of nine and ninety Coming Men, all--coming till they came.

Pure Mephistopheles all this? the vulgar nature jeers?

Good friend, while I was writing it, my eyes were dim with tears;

Thrice happy he who cannot see, or who his eyes can shut,

Life's deepest sorrow is contained in that small word there--But!

* * * * *

We're pretty nearly crazy here with change and go ahead, 80

With flinging our caught bird away for two i' th' bush instead,

With butting 'gainst the wall which we declare _shall_ be a portal,

And questioning Deeps that never yet have oped their lips to mortal;

We're growing pale and hollow-eyed, and out of all condition,

With _mediums_ and prophetic chairs, and crickets with a mission,

(The most astounding oracles since Balaam's donkey spoke,--

'Twould seem our furniture was all of Dodonean oak.)

Make but the public laugh, be sure 'twill take you to be somebody;

'Twill wrench its button from your clutch, my densely earnest glum body;

'Tis good, this noble earnestness, good in its place, but why 90

Make great Achilles' shield the pan to bake a penny pie?

Why, when we have a kitchen-range, insist that we shall stop,

And bore clear down to central fires to broil our daily chop?

Excalibur and Durandart are swords of price, but then

Why draw them sternly when you wish to trim your nails or pen?

Small gulf between the ape and man; you bridge it with your staff;

But it will be impassable until the ape can laugh;--

No, no, be common now and then, be sensible, be funny,

And, as Siberians bait their traps for bears with pots of honey,

From which ere they'll withdraw their snouts, they'll suffer many a

club-lick, 100

So bait your moral figure-of-fours to catch the Orson public.

Look how the dead leaves melt their way down through deep-drifted snow;

They take the sun-warmth down with them--pearls could not conquer so;

There _is_ a moral here, you see: if you would preach, you must

Steep all your truths in sunshine would you have them pierce the crust;

Brave Jeremiah, you are grand and terrible, a sign

And wonder, but were never quite a popular divine;

Fancy the figure you would cut among the nuts and wine!

I, on occasion, too, could preach, but hold it wiser far

To give the public sermons it will take with its cigar, 110

And morals fugitive, and vague as are these smoke-wreaths light

In which ... I trace ... a ... let me see--bless me! 'tis out of sight.

* * * * *

There are some goodish things at sea; for instance, one can feel

A grandeur in the silent man forever at the wheel,

That bit of two-legged intellect, that particle of drill,

Who the huge floundering hulk inspires with reason, brain, and will,

And makes the ship, though skies are black and headwinds whistle loud,

Obey her conscience there which feels the loadstar through the cloud;

And when by lusty western gales the full-sailed barque is hurled,

Towards the great moon which, setting on, the silent underworld, 120

Rounds luridly up to look on ours, and shoots a broadening line,

Of palpitant light from crest to crest across the ridgy brine,

Then from the bows look back and feel a thrill that never stales,

In that full-bosomed, swan-white pomp of onward-yearning sails;

Ah, when dear cousin Bull laments that you can't make a poem,

Take him aboard a clipper-ship, young Jonathan, and show him

A work of art that in its grace and grandeur may compare

With any thing that any race has fashioned any where;

'Tis not a statue, grumbles John; nay, if you come to that,

We think of Hyde Park Corner, and concede you beat us flat 130

With your equestrian statue to a Nose and a Cocked hat;

But 'tis not a cathedral; well, e'en that we will allow,

Both statues and cathedrals are anachronistic now;

Your minsters, coz, the monuments of men who conquered you,

You'd sell a bargain, if we'd take the deans and chapters too;

No; mortal men build nowadays, as always heretofore,

Good temples to the gods which they in very truth adore;

The shepherds of this Broker Age, with all their willing flocks,

Although they bow to stones no more, do bend the knee to stocks,

And churches can't be beautiful though crowded, floor and gallery, 140

If people worship preacher, and if preacher worship salary;

'Tis well to look things in the face, the god o' the modern universe,

Hermes, cares naught for halls of art and libraries of puny verse,

If they don't sell, he notes them thus upon his ledger--say, _per

Contra_ to a loss of so much stone, best Russia duck and paper;

And, after all, about this Art men talk a deal of fudge,

Each nation has its path marked out, from which it must not budge;

The Romans had as little art as Noah in his ark,

Yet somehow on this globe contrived to make an epic mark; 149

Religion, painting, sculpture, song--for these they ran up jolly ticks

With Greece and Egypt, but they were great artists in their politics,

And if we make no minsters, John, nor epics, yet the Fates

Are not entirely deaf to men who _can_ build ships and states;

The arts are never pioneers, but men have strength and health

Who, called on suddenly, can improvise a commonwealth,

Nay, can more easily go on and frame them by the dozen,

Than you can make a dinner-speech, dear sympathizing cousin;

And, though our restless Jonathan have not your graver bent, sure he

Does represent this hand-to-mouth, pert, rapid nineteenth century;

This is the Age of Scramble; men move faster than they did 160

When they pried up the imperial Past's deep-dusted coffin-lid,

Searching for scrolls of precedent; the wire-leashed lightning now

Replaces Delphos--men don't leave the steamer for the scow;

What public, were they new to-day, would ever stop to read

The Iliad, the Shanàmeh, or the Nibelungenlied?

_Their_ public's gone, the artist Greek, the lettered Shah,

the hairy Graf--

Folio and plesiosaur sleep well; _we_ weary o'er a paragraph;

The mind moves planet-like no more, it fizzes, cracks, and bustles;

From end to end with journals dry the land o'ershadowed rustles,

As with dead leaves a winter-beech, and, with their breath-roused

jars 170

Amused, we care not if they hide the eternal skies and stars;

Down to the general level of the Board of Brokers sinking,

The Age takes in the newspapers, or, to say sooth unshrinking,

The newspapers take in the Age, and stocks do all the thinking.

AN ORIENTAL APOLOGUE

Somewhere in India, upon a time,

(Read it not Injah, or you spoil the verse,)

There dwelt two saints whose privilege sublime

It was to sit and watch the world grow worse,

Their only care (in that delicious clime)

At proper intervals to pray and curse;

Pracrit the dialect each prudent brother

Used for himself, Damnonian for the other.

One half the time of each was spent in praying

For blessings on his own unworthy head, 10

The other half in fearfully portraying

Where certain folks would go when they were dead;

This system of exchanges--there's no saying

To what more solid barter 'twould have led,

But that a river, vext with boils and swellings

At rainy times, kept peace between their dwellings.

So they two played at wordy battledore

And kept a curse forever in the air,

Flying this way or that from shore to shore;

Nor other labor did this holy pair, 20

Clothed and supported from the lavish store

Which crowds lanigerous brought with daily care;

They toiled not, neither did they spin; their bias

Was tow'rd the harder task of being pious.

Each from his hut rushed six score times a day,

Like a great canon of the Church full-rammed

With cartridge theologic, (so to say,)

Touched himself off, and then, recoiling, slammed

His hovel's door behind him in away

That to his foe said plainly,--_you'll_ be damned; 30

And so like Potts and Wainwright, shrill and strong

The two D---- D'd each other all day long.

One was a dancing Dervise, a Mohammedan,

The other was a Hindoo, a gymnosophist;

One kept his whatd'yecallit and his Ramadan,

Laughing to scorn the sacred rites and laws of his

Transfluvial rival, who, in turn, called Ahmed an

Old top, and, as a clincher, shook across a fist

With nails six inches long, yet lifted not

His eyes from off his navel's mystic knot. 40

'Who whirls not round six thousand times an hour

Will go,' screamed Ahmed, 'to the evil place;

May he eat dirt, and may the dog and Giaour

Defile the graves of him and all his race;

Allah loves faithful souls and gives them power

To spin till they are purple in the face;

Some folks get you know what, but he that pure is

Earns Paradise and ninety thousand houris.'

'Upon the silver mountain, South by East,

Sits Brahma fed upon the sacred bean; 30

He loves those men whose nails are still increased,

Who all their lives keep ugly, foul, and lean;

'Tis of his grace that not a bird or beast

Adorned with claws like mine was ever seen;

The suns and stars are Brahma's thoughts divine,

Even as these trees I seem to see are mine.'

'Thou seem'st to see, indeed!' roared Ahmed back;

'Were I but once across this plaguy stream,

With a stout sapling in my hand, one whack

On those lank ribs would rid thee of that dream! 60

Thy Brahma-blasphemy is ipecac

To my soul's stomach; couldst thou grasp the scheme

Of true redemption, thou wouldst know that Deity

Whirls by a kind of blessed spontaneity.

'And this it is which keeps our earth here going

With all the stars.'--'Oh, vile! but there's a place

Prepared for such; to think of Brahma throwing

Worlds like a juggler's balls up into Space!

Why, not so much as a smooth lotos blowing

Is e'er allowed that silence to efface 70

Which broods round Brahma, and our earth, 'tis known,

Rests on a tortoise, moveless as this stone.'

So they kept up their banning amoebæan,

When suddenly came floating down the stream

A youth whose face like an incarnate pæan

Glowed, 'twas so full of grandeur and of gleam;

'If there _be_ gods, then, doubtless, this must be one,'

Thought both at once, and then began to scream,

'Surely, whate'er immortals know, thou knowest,

Decide between us twain before thou goest!' 80

The youth was drifting in a slim canoe

Most like a huge white water-lily's petal,

But neither of our theologians knew

Whereof 'twas made; whether of heavenly metal

Seldseen, or of a vast pearl split in two

And hollowed, was a point they could not settle;

'Twas good debate-seed, though, and bore large fruit

In after years of many a tart dispute.

There were no wings upon the stranger's shoulders.

And yet he seemed so capable of rising 90

That, had he soared like thistle-down, beholders

Had thought the circumstance noways surprising;

Enough that he remained, and, when the scolders

Hailed him as umpire in their vocal prize-ring,

The painter of his boat he lightly threw

Around a lotos-stem, and brought her to.

The strange youth had a look as if he might

Have trod far planets where the atmosphere

(Of nobler temper) steeps the face with light,

Just as our skins are tanned and freckled here; 100

His air was that of a cosmopolite

In the wide universe from sphere to sphere;

Perhaps he was (his face had such grave beauty)

An officer of Saturn's guards off duty.

Both saints began to unfold their tales at once,

Both wished their tales, like simial ones, prehensile,

That they might seize his ear; _fool! knave!_ and _dunce!_

Flew zigzag back and forth, like strokes of pencil

In a child's fingers; voluble as duns,

They jabbered like the stones on that immense hill 110

In the Arabian Nights; until the stranger

Began to think his ear-drums in some danger.

In general those who nothing have to say

Contrive to spend the longest time in doing it;

They turn and vary it in every way,

Hashing it, stewing it, mincing it, _ragouting_ it;

Sometimes they keep it purposely at bay,

Then let it slip to be again pursuing it;

They drone it, groan it, whisper it and shout it,

Refute it, flout it, swear to 't, prove it, doubt it. 120

Our saints had practised for some thirty years;

Their talk, beginning with a single stem,

Spread like a banyan, sending down live piers,

Colonies of digression, and, in them,

Germs of yet new dispersion; once by the ears,

They could convey damnation in a hem,

And blow the pinch of premise-priming off

Long syllogistic batteries, with a cough.

Each had a theory that the human ear

A providential tunnel was, which led 130

To a huge vacuum (and surely here

They showed some knowledge of the general head,)

For cant to be decanted through, a mere

Auricular canal or mill-race fed

All day and night, in sunshine and in shower,

From their vast heads of milk-and-water-power.

The present being a peculiar case,

Each with unwonted zeal the other scouted,

Put his spurred hobby through its every pace, 139

Pished, pshawed, poohed, horribled, bahed, jeered, sneered, flouted,

Sniffed, nonsensed, infideled, fudged, with his face

Looked scorn too nicely shaded to be shouted,

And, with each inch of person and of vesture,

Contrived to hint some most disdainful gesture.

At length, when their breath's end was come about,

And both could now and then just gasp 'impostor!'

Holding their heads thrust menacingly out,

As staggering cocks keep up their fighting posture,

The stranger smiled and said, 'Beyond a doubt

'Tis fortunate, my friends, that you have lost your 150

United parts of speech, or it had been

Impossible for me to get between.

'Produce! says Nature,--what have you produced?

A new strait-waistcoat for the human mind;

Are you not limbed, nerved, jointed, arteried, juiced,

As other men? yet, faithless to your kind,

Rather like noxious insects you are used

To puncture life's fair fruit, beneath the rind

Laying your creed-eggs, whence in time there spring

Consumers new to eat and buzz and sting. 160

'Work! you have no conception how 'twill sweeten

Your views of Life and Nature, God and Man;

Had you been forced to earn what you have eaten,

Your heaven had shown a less dyspeptic plan;

At present your whole function is to eat ten

And talk ten times as rapidly as you can;

Were your shape true to cosmogonic laws,

You would be nothing but a pair of jaws.

'Of all the useless beings in creation

The earth could spare most easily you bakers 170

Of little clay gods, formed in shape and fashion

Precisely in the image of their makers;

Why it would almost move a saint to passion,

To see these blind and deaf, the hourly breakers

Of God's own image in their brother men,

Set themselves up to tell the how, where, when,

'Of God's existence; one's digestion's worse--

So makes a god of vengeance and of blood;

Another,--but no matter, they reverse

Creation's plan, out of their own vile mud 180

Pat up a god, and burn, drown, hang, or curse

Whoever worships not; each keeps his stud

Of texts which wait with saddle on and bridle

To hunt down atheists to their ugly idol.

'This, I perceive, has been your occupation;

You should have been more usefully employed;

All men are bound to earn their daily ration,

Where States make not that primal contract void

By cramps and limits; simple devastation

Is the worm's task, and what he has destroyed 190

His monument; creating is man's work,

And that, too, something more than mist and murk.'

So having said, the youth was seen no more,

And straightway our sage Brahmin, the philosopher,

Cried, 'That was aimed at thee, thou endless bore,

Idle and useless as the growth of moss over

A rotting tree-trunk!' 'I would square that score

Full soon,' replied the Dervise, 'could I cross over

And catch thee by the beard. Thy nails I'd trim

And make thee work, as was advised by him. 200

'Work? Am I not at work from morn till night

Sounding the deeps of oracles umbilical

Which for man's guidance never come to light,

With all their various aptitudes, until I call?'

'And I, do I not twirl from left to right

For conscience' sake? Is that no work? Thou silly gull,

He had thee in his eye; 'twas Gabriel

Sent to reward my faith, I know him well.'

'Twas Vishnu, thou vile whirligig!' and so

The good old quarrel was begun anew; 210

One would have sworn the sky was black as sloe,

Had but the other dared to call it blue;

Nor were the followers who fed them slow

To treat each other with their curses, too,

Each hating t'other (moves it tears or laughter?)

Because he thought him sure of hell hereafter.

At last some genius built a bridge of boats

Over the stream, and Ahmed's zealots filed

Across, upon a mission to (cut throats

And) spread religion pure and undefiled; 220

They sowed the propagandist's wildest oats,

Cutting off all, down to the smallest child,

And came back, giving thanks for such fat mercies,

To find their harvest gone past prayers or curses.

All gone except their saint's religious hops,

Which he kept up with more than common flourish;

But these, however satisfying crops

For the inner man, were not enough to nourish

The body politic, which quickly drops

Reserve in such sad junctures, and turns currish; 230

So Ahmed soon got cursed for all the famine

Where'er the popular voice could edge a damn in.

At first he pledged a miracle quite boldly.

And, for a day or two, they growled and waited;

But, finding that this kind of manna coldly

Sat on their stomachs, they erelong berated

The saint for still persisting in that old lie,

Till soon the whole machine of saintship grated,

Ran slow, creaked, stopped, and, wishing him in Tophet,

They gathered strength enough to stone the prophet. 240

Some stronger ones contrived (by eatting leather,

Their weaker friends, and one thing or another)

The winter months of scarcity to weather;

Among these was the late saint's younger brother,

Who, in the spring, collecting them together,

Persuaded them that Ahmed's holy pother

Had wrought in their behalf, and that the place

Of Saint should be continued to his race.

Accordingly, 'twas settled on the spot

That Allah favored that peculiar breed; 250

Beside, as all were satisfied, 'twould not

Be quite respectable to have the need

Of public spiritual food forgot;

And so the tribe, with proper forms, decreed

That he, and, failing him, his next of kin,

Forever for the people's good should spin.

THE BIGLOW PAPERS

FIRST SERIES

NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS

[I have observed, reader (bene-or male-volent, as it may happen), that

it is customary to append to the second editions of books, and to the

second works of authors, short sentences commendatory of the first,

under the title of _Notices of the Press_. These, I have been given to

understand, are procurable at certain established rates, payment being

made either in money or advertising patronage by the publisher, or by an

adequate outlay of servility on the part of the author. Considering

these things with myself, and also that such notices are neither

intended, nor generally believed, to convey any real opinions, being a

purely ceremonial accompaniment of literature, and resembling

certificates to the virtues of various morbiferal panaceas, I conceived

that it would be not only more economical to prepare a sufficient number

of such myself, but also more immediately subservient to the end in view

to prefix them to this our primary edition rather than to await the

contingency of a second, when they would seem to be of small utility. To

delay attaching the _bobs_ until the second attempt at flying the kite

would indicate but a slender experience in that useful art. Neither has

it escaped my notice nor failed to afford me matter of reflection, that,

when a circus or a caravan is about to visit Jaalam, the initial step is

to send forward large and highly ornamented bills of performance, to be

hung in the bar-room and the post-office. These having been sufficiently

gazed at, and beginning to lose their attractiveness except for the

flies, and, truly, the boys also (in whom I find it impossible to

repress, even during school-hours, certain oral and telegraphic

communications concerning the expected show), upon some fine morning the

band enters in a gayly painted wagon, or triumphal chariot, and with

noisy advertisement, by means of brass, wood, and sheepskin, makes the

circuit of our startled village streets. Then, as the exciting sounds

draw nearer and nearer, do I desiderate those eyes of Aristarchus,

'whose looks were as a breeching to a boy.' Then do I perceive, with

vain regret of wasted opportunities, the advantage of a pancratic or

pantechnic education, since he is most reverenced by my little subjects

who can throw the cleanest summerset or walk most securely upon the

revolving cask. The story of the Pied Piper becomes for the first time

credible to me (albeit confirmed by the Hameliners dating their legal

instruments from the period of his exit), as I behold how those strains,

without pretence of magical potency, bewitch the pupillary legs, nor

leave to the pedagogic an entire self-control. For these reasons, lest

my kingly prerogative should suffer diminution, I prorogue my restless

commons, whom I follow into the street, chiefly lest some mischief may

chance befall them. After the manner of such a band, I send forward the

following notices of domestic manufacture, to make brazen proclamation,

not unconscious of the advantage which will accrue, if our little craft,

_cymbula sutilis_, shall seem to leave port with a clipping breeze, and

to carry, in nautical phrase, a bone in her mouth. Nevertheless, I have

chosen, as being more equitable, to prepare some also sufficiently

objurgatory, that readers of every taste may find a dish to their

palate. I have modelled them upon actually existing specimens, preserved

in my own cabinet of natural curiosities. One, in particular, I had

copied with tolerable exactness from a notice of one of my own

discourses, which, from its superior tone and appearance of vast

experience, I concluded to have been written by a man at least three

hundred years of age, though I recollected no existing instance of such

antediluvian longevity. Nevertheless, I afterwards discovered the author

to be a young gentleman preparing for the ministry under the direction

of one of my brethren in a neighboring town, and whom I had once

instinctively corrected in a Latin quantity. But this I have been

forced to omit, from its too great length.--H.W.]

* * * * *

_From the Universal Littery Universe_.

Full of passages which rivet the attention of the reader.... Under a

rustic garb, sentiments are conveyed which should be committed to the

memory and engraven on the heart of every moral and social being.... We

consider this a _unique_ performance.... We hope to see it soon

introduced into our common schools.... Mr. Wilbur has performed his

duties as editor with excellent taste and judgment.... This is a vein

which we hope to see successfully prosecuted.... We hail the appearance

of this work as a long stride toward the formation of a purely

aboriginal, indigenous, native, and American literature. We rejoice to

meet with an author national enough to break away from the slavish

deference, too common among us, to English grammar and orthography....

Where all is so good, we are at a loss how to make extracts.... On the

whole, we may call it a volume which no library, pretending to entire

completeness, should fail to place upon its shelves.

* * * * *

_From the Higginbottomopolis Snapping-turtle_.

A collection of the merest balderdash and doggerel that it was ever our

bad fortune to lay eyes on. The author is a vulgar buffoon, and the

editor a talkative, tedious old fool. We use strong language, but should

any of our readers peruse the book, (from which calamity Heaven preserve

them!) they will find reasons for it thick as the leaves of

Vallum-brozer, or, to use a still more expressive comparison, as the

combined heads of author and editor. The work is wretchedly got up....

We should like to know how much _British gold_ was pocketed by this

libeller of our country and her purest patriots.

* * * * *

_From the Oldfogrumville Mentor_.

We have not had time to do more than glance through this handsomely

printed volume, but the name of its respectable editor, the Rev. Mr.

Wilbur, of Jaalam, will afford a sufficient guaranty for the worth of

its contents.... The paper is white, the type clear, and the volume of a

convenient and attractive size.... In reading this elegantly executed

work, it has seemed to us that a passage or two might have been

retrenched with advantage, and that the general style of diction was

susceptible of a higher polish.... On the whole, we may safely leave the

ungrateful task of criticism to the reader. We will barely suggest, that

in volumes intended, as this is, for the illustration of a provincial

dialect and turns of expression, a dash of humor or satire might be

thrown in with advantage.... The work is admirably got up.... This work

will form an appropriate ornament to the centre table. It is beautifully

printed, on paper of an excellent quality.

* * * * *

_From the Dekay Bulwark_.

We should be wanting in our duty as the conductor of that tremendous

engine, a public press, as an American, and as a man, did we allow such

an opportunity as is presented to us by 'The Biglow Papers' to pass by

without entering our earnest protest against such attempts (now, alas!

too common) at demoralizing the public sentiment. Under a wretched mask

of stupid drollery, slavery, war, the social glass, and, in short, all

the valuable and time-honored institutions justly dear to our common

humanity and especially to republicans, are made the butt of coarse and

senseless ribaldry by this low-minded scribbler. It is time that the

respectable and religious portion of our community should be aroused to

the alarming inroads of foreign Jacobinism, sansculottism, and

infidelity. It is a fearful proof of the widespread nature of this

contagion, that these secret stabs at religion and virtue are given from

under the cloak (_credite, posteri!_) of a clergyman. It is a mournful

spectacle indeed to the patriot and Christian to see liberality and new

ideas (falsely so called,--they are as old as Eden) invading the sacred

precincts of the pulpit.... On the whole, we consider this volume as one

of the first shocking results which we predicted would spring out of the

late French 'Revolution' (!)

* * * * *

_From the Bungtown Copper and Comprehensive Tocsin (a try-weakly family

journal)_.

Altogether an admirable work.... Full of humor, boisterous, but

delicate,--of wit withering and scorching, yet combined with a pathos

cool as morning dew,--of satire ponderous as the mace of Richard, yet

keen as the scymitar of Saladin.... A work full of 'mountain-mirth,'

mischievous as Puck, and lightsome as Ariel.... We know not whether to

admire most the genial, fresh, and discursive concinnity of the author,

or his playful fancy, weird imagination, and compass of style, at once

both objective and subjective.... We might indulge in some criticisms,

but, were the author other than he is, he would be a different being. As

it is, he has a wonderful _pose_, which flits from flower to flower, and

bears the reader irresistibly along on its eagle pinions (like Ganymede)

to the 'highest heaven of invention.' ... We love a book so purely

objective ... Many of his pictures of natural scenery have an

extraordinary subjective clearness and fidelity.... In fine, we consider

this as one of the most extraordinary volumes of this or any age. We

know of no English author who could have written it. It is a work to

which the proud genius of our country, standing with one foot on the

Aroostook and the other on the Rio Grande, and holding up the

star-spangled banner amid the wreck of matter and the crush of worlds,

may point with bewildering scorn of the punier efforts of enslaved

Europe.... We hope soon to encounter our author among those higher walks

of literature in which he is evidently capable of achieving enduring

fame. Already we should be inclined to assign him a high position in the

bright galaxy of our American bards.

* * * * *

_From the Saltriver Pilot and Flag of Freedom._

A volume in bad grammar and worse taste.... While the pieces here

collected were confined to their appropriate sphere in the corners of

obscure newspapers, we considered them wholly beneath contempt, but, as

the author has chosen to come forward in this public manner, he must

expect the lash he so richly merits.... Contemptible slanders.... Vilest

Billingsgate.... Has raked all the gutters of our language.... The most

pure, upright, and consistent politicians not safe from his malignant

venom.... General Cushing comes in for a share of his vile calumnies....

The _Reverend_ Homer Wilbur is a disgrace to his cloth....

* * * * *

_From the World-Harmonic-Æolian-Attachment_.

Speech is silver: silence is golden. No utterance more Orphic than this.

While, therefore, as highest author, we reverence him whose works

continue heroically unwritten, we have also our hopeful word for those

who with pen (from wing of goose loud-cackling, or seraph

God-commissioned) record the thing that is revealed.... Under mask of

quaintest irony, we detect here the deep, storm-tost (nigh ship-wracked)

soul, thunder-scarred, semi-articulate, but ever climbing hopefully

toward the peaceful summits of an Infinite Sorrow.... Yes, thou poor,

forlorn Hosea, with Hebrew fire-flaming soul in thee, for thee also this

life of ours has not been without its aspects of heavenliest pity and

laughingest mirth. Conceivable enough! Through coarse Thersites-cloak,

we have revelation of the heart, wild-glowing, world-clasping, that is

in him. Bravely he grapples with the life-problem as it presents itself

to him, uncombed, shaggy, careless of the 'nicer proprieties,' inexpert

of 'elegant diction,' yet with voice audible enough to whoso hath ears,

up there on the gravelly side-hills, or down on the splashy,

indiarubber-like salt-marshes of native Jaalam. To this soul also the

_Necessity of Creating_ somewhat has unveiled its awful front. If not

Oedipuses and Electras and Alcestises, then in God's name Birdofredum

Sawins! These also shall get born into the world, and filch (if so need)

a Zingali subsistence therein, these lank, omnivorous Yankees of his. He

shall paint the Seen, since the Unseen will not sit to him. Yet in him

also are Nibelungen-lays, and Iliads, and Ulysses-wanderings, and Divine

Comedies,--if only once he could come at them! Therein lies much, nay

all; for what truly is this which we name _All_, but that which we do

_not_ possess?... Glimpses also are given us of an old father Ezekiel,

not without paternal pride, as is the wont of such. A brown,

parchment-hided old man of the geoponic or bucolic species, gray-eyed,

we fancy, _queued_ perhaps, with much weather-cunning and plentiful

September-gale memories, bidding fair in good time to become the Oldest

Inhabitant. After such hasty apparition, he vanishes and is seen no

more.... Of 'Rev. Homer Wilbur, A.M., Pastor of the First Church in

Jaalam,' we have small care to speak here. Spare touch in him of his

Melesigenes namesake, save, haply, the--blindness! A tolerably

caliginose, nephelegeretous elderly gentleman, with infinite faculty of

sermonizing, muscularized by long practice and excellent digestive

apparatus, and, for the rest, well-meaning enough, and with small

private illuminations (somewhat tallowy, it is to be feared) of his own.

To him, there, 'Pastor of the First Church in Jaalam,' our Hosea

presents himself as a quite inexplicable Sphinx-riddle. A rich poverty

of Latin and Greek,--so far is clear enough, even to eyes peering myopic

through horn-lensed editorial spectacles,--but naught farther? O

purblind, well-meaning, altogether fuscous Melesigenes-Wilbur, there are

things in him incommunicable by stroke of birch! Did it ever enter that

old bewildered head of thine that there was the _Possibility of the

Infinite_ in him? To thee, quite wingless (and even featherless) biped,

has not so much even as a dream of wings ever come? 'Talented young

parishioner'? Among the Arts whereof thou art _Magister_, does that of

_seeing_ happen to be one? Unhappy _Artium Magister!_ Somehow a Nemean

lion, fulvous, torrid-eyed, dry-nursed in broad-howling

sand-wildernesses of a sufficiently rare spirit-Libya (it may be

supposed) has got whelped among the sheep. Already he stands

wild-glaring, with feet clutching the ground as with oak-roots,

gathering for a Remus-spring over the walls of thy little fold. In

heaven's name, go not near him with that flybite crook of thine! In good

time, thou painful preacher, thou wilt go to the appointed place of

departed Artillery-Election Sermons, Right-hands of Fellowship, and

Results of Councils, gathered to thy spiritual fathers with much Latin

of the Epitaphial sort; thou too, shalt have thy reward; but on him the

Eumenides have looked, not Xantippes of the pit, snake-tressed,

finger-threatening, but radiantly calm as on antique gems; for him paws

impatient the winged courser of the gods, champing unwelcome bit; him

the starry deeps, the empyrean glooms, and far-flashing splendors await.

* * * * *

_From the Onion Grove Phoenix._

A talented young townsman of ours, recently returned from a Continental

tour, and who is already favorably known to our readers by his sprightly

letters from abroad which have graced our columns, called at our office

yesterday. We learn from him, that, having enjoyed the distinguished

privilege, while in Germany, of an introduction to the celebrated Von

Humbug, he took the opportunity to present that eminent man with a copy

of the 'Biglow Papers.' The next morning he received the following note,

which he has kindly furnished us for publication. We prefer to print it

_verbatim_, knowing that our readers will readily forgive the few errors

into which the lllustrious writer has fallen, through ignorance of our

language.

'HIGH-WORTHY MISTER!

'I shall also now especially happy starve, because I have more or less a

work of one those aboriginal Red-Men seen in which have I so deaf an

interest ever taken full-worthy on the self shelf with our Gottsched to

be upset.

'Pardon my in the English-speech un-practice!

'Von Humbug.'

He also sent with the above note a copy of his famous work on

'Cosmetics,' to be presented to Mr. Biglow; but this was taken from our

friend by the English custom-house officers, probably through a petty

national spite. No doubt, it has by this time found its way into the

British Museum. We trust this outrage will be exposed in all our

American papers. We shall do our best to bring it to the notice of the

State Department. Our numerous readers will share in the pleasure we

experience at seeing our young and vigorous national literature thus

encouragingly patted on the head by this venerable and world-renowned

German. We love to see these reciprocations of good-feeling between the

different branches of the great Anglo-Saxon race.

[The following genuine 'notice' having met my eye, I gladly insert a

portion of it here, the more especially as it contains one of Mr.

Biglow's poems not elsewhere printed.--H.W.]

_From the Jaalam Independent Blunderbuss._

... But, while we lament to see our young townsman thus mingling in the

heated contests of party politics, we think we detect in him the

presence of talents which, if properly directed, might give an innocent

pleasure to many. As a proof that he is competent to the production of

other kinds of poetry, we copy for our readers a short fragment of a

pastoral by him, the manuscript of which was loaned us by a friend. The

title of it is 'The Courtin'.'

Zekle crep' up, quite unbeknown,

An' peeked in thru the winder,

An' there sot Huldy all alone,

'ith no one nigh to hender.

Agin' the chimbly crooknecks hung,

An' in amongst 'em rusted

The ole queen's-arm thet gran'ther Young

Fetched back frum Concord busted.

The wannut logs shot sparkles out

Towards the pootiest, bless her!

An' leetle fires danced all about

The chlny on the dresser.

The very room, coz she wuz in,

Looked warm frum floor to ceilin',

An' she looked full ez rosy agin

Ez th' apples she wuz peelin'.

She heerd a foot an' knowed it, tu,

Araspin' on the scraper,--

All ways to once her feelins flew

Like sparks in burnt-up paper.

He kin' o' l'itered on the mat,

Some doubtfle o' the seekle;

His heart kep' goin' pitypat,

But hern went pity Zekle.

An' yet she gin her cheer a jerk

Ez though she wished him furder,

An' on her apples kep' to work

Ez ef a wager spurred her.

'You want to see my Pa, I spose?'

'Wall, no; I come designin'--'

'To see my Ma? She's sprinklin' clo'es

Agin to-morrow's i'nin'.'

He stood a spell on one foot fust,

Then stood a spell on tother,

An' on which one he felt the wust

He couldn't ha' told ye, nuther.

Sez he, 'I'd better call agin;'

Sez she,'Think likely, _Mister;_'

The last word pricked him like a pin,

An'--wal, he up and kist her.

When Ma bimeby upon 'em slips,

Huldy sot pale ez ashes,

All kind o'smily round the lips

An' teary round the lashes.

Her blood riz quick, though, like the tide

Down to the Bay o' Fundy,

An' all I know is they wuz cried

In meetin', come nex Sunday.

SATIS multis sese emptores futuros libri professis, Georgius Nichols,

Cantabrigiensis, opus emittet de parte gravi sed adhuc neglecta

historiæ naturalis, cum titulo sequente, videlicet:

_Conatus ad Delineationem naturalem nonnihil perfectiorem Scarabæi

Bombilatoris, vulgo dicti_ HUMBUG, ab HOMERO WILBUR, Artium Magistro,

Societatis historico-naturalis Jaalamensis Præside (Secretario,

Socioque (eheu!) singulo), multarumque aliarum Societatum eruditarum

(sive ineruditarum) tam domesticarum quam transmarinarum Socio--forsitan

futuro.

PROEMIUM

LECTORI BENEVOLO S.

Toga scholastica nondum deposita, quum systemata varia entomologica, a

viris ejus scientiæ cultoribus studiosissimis summa diligentia

ædificata, penitus indagassem, non fuit quin luctuose omnibus in iis,

quamvis aliter laude dignissimis, hiatum magni momenti perciperem. Tunc,

nescio quo motu superiore impulsus, aut qua captus dulcedine operis, ad

eum implendum (Curtius alter) me solemniter devovi. Nec ab isto labore,

[Greek: daimonios] imposito, abstinui antequam tractatulum sufficienter

inconcinnum lingua vernacula perfeceram. Inde, juveniliter tumefactus,

et barathro ineptiæ [Greek: ton bibliopolon] (necnon 'Publici

Legentis') nusquam explorato, me composuisse quod quasi placentas

præfervidas (ut sic dicam) homines ingurgitarent credidi. Sed, quum

huic et alio bibliopolæ MSS. mea submisissem et nihil solidius

responsione valde negativa in Musæum meum retulissem, horror ingens

atque misericordia, ob crassitudinem Lambertianam in cerebris

homunculorum istius muneris coelesti quadam ira infixam, me invasere.

Extemplo mei solius impensis librum edere decrevi, nihil omnino dubitans

quin 'Mundus Scientificus' (ut aiunt) crumenam meam ampliter repleret.

Nullam, attamen, ex agro illo meo parvulo segetem demessui præter

gaudium vacuum bene de Republica merendi. Iste panis meus pretiosus

super aquas literarias fæculentas præfidenter jactus, quasi Harpyiaram

quarundam (scilicet bibliopolarum istorum facinorosorum supradictorum)

tactu rancidus, intra perpaucos dies mihi domum rediit. Et, quum ipse

tali victu ali non tolerarem, primum in mentem venit pistori (typographo

nempe) nihilominus solvendum esse. Animum non idcirco demisi, imo æque

ac pueri naviculas suas penes se lino retinent (eo ut e recto cursu

delapsas ad ripam retrahant), sic ego Argâ meam chartaceam fluctibus

laborantem a quæsitu velleris aurei, ipse potius tonsus pelleque

exutus, mente solida revocavi. Metaphoram ut mutem, _boomarangam_ meam a

scopo aberrantem, retraxi, dum majore vi, occasione ministrante,

adversus Fortunam intorquerem. Ast mihi, talia volventi, et, sicut

Saturnus ille [Greek: paidoboros], liberos intellectûs mei depascere

fidenti, casus miserandus, nec antea inauditus, supervenit. Nam, ut

ferunt Scythas pietatis causa et parsimoniæ, parentes suos mortuos

devorâsse, sic filius hic meus primogenitus, Scythis ipsis minus

mansuetus, patrem vivum totum et calcitrantem exsorbere enixus est. Nec

tamen hac de causa sobolem meam esurientem exheredavi. Sed famem istam

pro valido testimonio virilitatis roborisque potius habui, cibumque ad

eam satiandam, salva paterna mea carne, petii. Et quia bilem illam

scaturientem ad æs etiam concoquendum idoneam esse estimabam, unde æs

alienum, ut minoris pretii, haberem, circumspexi. Rebus ita se

habentibus, ab avunculo meo Johanne Doolittie, Armigero, impetravi ut

pecunias necessarias suppeditaret, ne opus esset mihi universitatem

relinquendi antequam ad gradum primum in artibus pervenissem. Tune ego,

salvum facere patronum meum munificum maxime cupiens, omnes libros

primæ editionis operis mei non venditos una cum privilegio in omne

ævum ejusdem imprimendi et edendi avunculo meo dicto pigneravi. Ex illo

die, atro lapide notando, curæ vociferantes familiæ singulis annis

crescentis eo usque insultabant ut nunquam tam carum pignus e vinculis

istis aheneis solvere possem.

Avunculo vero nuper mortuo, quum inter alios consanguineos testamenti

ejus lectionem audiendi causa advenissem, erectis auribus verba talia

sequentia accepi: 'Quoniam persuasum habeo meum dilectum nepotem

Homerum, longa et intima rerum angustarum domi experientia, aptissimum

esse qui divitias tueatur, beneficenterque ac prudenter iis divinis

creditis utatur,--ergo, motus hisce cogitationibus, exque amore meo in

illum magno, do, legoque nepoti caro meo supranominato omnes

singularesque istas possessiones nec ponderabiles nec computabiles meas

quæ sequuntur, scilicet: quingentos libros quos mihi pigneravit dictus

Homerus, anno lucis 1792, cum privilegio edendi et repetendi opus istud

"scientificum" (quod dicunt) suum, si sic elegerit. Tamen D.O.M, precor

oculos Homeri nepotis mei ita aperiat eumque moveat, ut libros istos in

bibliotheca unius e plurimis castellis suis Hispaniensibus tuto

abscondat.'

His verbis vix credibilibus, auditis, cor meum in pectore exsultavit.

Deinde, quoniam tractatus Anglice scriptus spem auctoris fefellerat,

quippe quum studium Historiæ Naturalis in Republica nostra inter

factionis strepitum languescat, Latine versum edere statui, et eo potius

quia nescio quomodo disciplina academica et duo diplomata proficiant,

nisi quod peritos linguarum omnino mortuarum (et damnandarum, ut dicebat

iste [Greek: panourgos] Guilielmus Cobbett) nos faciant.

Et mihi adhue superstes est tota illa editio prima, quam quasi

crepitaculum per quod dentes caninos dentibam retineo.

* * * * *

OPERIS SPECIMEN

(_Ad exemplum Johannis Physiophili speciminis Monachologiæ_)

12. S.B. _Militaris_, WILBUR. _Carnifex_, JABLONSK. _Profanus_, DESFONT.

[Male hanece speciem _Cyclopem_ Fabricius vocat, ut qui singulo oculo ad

quod sui interest distinguitur. Melius vero Isaacus Outis nullum inter

S. milit. S. que Belzebul (Fabric. 152) discrimen esse defendit]

Habitat civitat. Americ. austral.

Aureis lineis splendidus; plerumque tamen sordidus, utpote lanienas

valde frequentans, foetore sanguinis allectus. Amat quoque insuper septa

apricari, neque inde, nisi maxima conatione detruditur. _Candidatus_

ergo populariter vocatus. Caput cristam quasi pennarum ostendit. Pro

cibo vaccam publicam callide mulget; abdomen enorme; facultas suctus

haud facile estimanda. Otiosus, fatuus; ferox nihilominus, semperque

dimicare paratus. Tortuose repit.

Capite sæpe maxima cum cura dissecto, ne illud rudimentum etiam cerebri

commune omnibus prope insectis detegere poteram.

Unam de hoc S. milit. rem singularem notavi; nam S. Guineens. (Fabric.

143) servos facit, et idcirco a multis summa in reverentia habitus,

quasi scintillas rationis pæne humanæ demonstrans.

24. S.B. _Criticus_, WILBUR. _Zoilus_, FABRIC. _Pygmæus_, CARLSEN.

[Stultissime Johannes Stryx cum S. punctato (Fabric. 64-109) confundit.

Specimina quamplurima scrutationi microscopicæ subjeci, nunquam tamen

unum ulla indicia puncti cujusvis prorsus ostendentem inveni.]

Præcipue formidolosus, insectatusque, in proxima rima anonyma sese

abscondit, _we, we_, creberrime stridens. Ineptus, segnipes.

Habitat ubique gentium; in sicco; nidum suum terebratione indefessa

ædificans. Cibus. Libros depascit; siccos præcipue.

MELIBOEUS-HIPPONAX

* * * * *

THE

Biglow Papers

EDITED,

WITH AN INTRODUCTION, NOTES, GLOSSARY, AND COPIOUS INDEX,

BY

HOMER WILBUR, A.M.,

PASTOR OF THE FIRST CHURCH IN JAALAM, AND (PROSPECTIVE) MEMBER OF

MANY LITERARY, LEARNED, AND SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES,

(_for which see page 227_.)

The ploughman's whistle, or the trivial flute,

Finds more respect than great Apollo's lute.

_Quarles's Emblems_, B. ii. E. 8.

Margaritas, munde porcine, calcasti: en, siliquas accipe.

_Jac. Car. Fil. ad Pub. Leg._ Section 1.

NOTE TO TITLE-PAGE

It will not have escaped the attentive eye, that I have, on the

title-page, omitted those honorary appendages to the editorial name

which not only add greatly to the value of every book, but whet and

exacerbate the appetite of the reader. For not only does he surmise that

an honorary membership of literary and scientific societies implies a

certain amount of necessary distinction on the part of the recipient of

such decorations, but he is willing to trust himself more entirely to an

author who writes under the fearful responsibility of involving the

reputation of such bodies as the _S. Archæol. Dahom._ or the _Acad.

Lit. et Scient. Kamtschat_. I cannot but think that the early editions

of Shakespeare and Milton would have met with more rapid and general

acceptance, but for the barrenness of their respective title-pages; and

I believe that, even now, a publisher of the works of either of those

justly distinguished men would find his account in procuring their

admission to the membership of learned bodies on the Continent,--a

proceeding no whit more incongruous than the reversal of the judgment

against Socrates, when he was already more than twenty centuries beyond

the reach of antidotes, and when his memory had acquired a deserved

respectability. I conceive that it was a feeling of the importance of

this precaution which induced Mr. Locke to style himself 'Gent.' on the

title-page of his Essay, as who should say to his readers that they

could receive his metaphysics on the honor of a gentleman.

Nevertheless, finding that, without descending to a smaller size of type

than would have been compatible with the dignity of the several

societies to be named, I could not compress my intended list within the

limits of a single page, and thinking, moreover, that the act would

carry with it an air of decorous modesty, I have chosen to take the

reader aside, as it were, into my private closet, and there not only

exhibit to him the diplomas which I already possess, but also to furnish

him with a prophetic vision of those which I may, without undue

presumption, hope for, as not beyond the reach of human ambition and

attainment. And I am the rather induced to this from the fact that my

name has been unaccountably dropped from the last triennial catalogue of

our beloved _Alma Mater_. Whether this is to be attributed to the

difficulty of Latinizing any of those honorary adjuncts (with a complete

list of which I took care to furnish the proper persons nearly a year

beforehand), or whether it had its origin in any more culpable motives,

I forbear to consider in this place, the matter being in course of

painful investigation. But, however this may be, I felt the omission the

more keenly, as I had, in expectation of the new catalogue, enriched the

library of the Jaalam Athenæum with the old one then in my possession,

by which means it has come about that my children will be deprived of a

never-wearying winter evening's amusement in looking out the name of

their parent in that distinguished roll. Those harmless innocents had at

least committed no--but I forbear, having intrusted my reflections and

animadversions on this painful topic to the safe-keeping of my private

diary, intended for posthumous publication. I state this fact here, in

order that certain nameless individuals, who are, perhaps, overmuch

congratulating themselves upon my silence, may know that a rod is in

pickle which the vigorous hand of a justly incensed posterity will apply

to their memories.

The careful reader will note that, in the list which I have prepared, I

have included the names of several Cisatlantic societies to which a

place is not commonly assigned in processions of this nature. I have

ventured to do this, not only to encourage native ambition and genius,

but also because I have never been able to perceive in what way distance

(unless we suppose them at the end of a lever) could increase the weight

of learned bodies. As far as I have been able to extend my researches

among such stuffed specimens as occasionally reach America, I have

discovered no generic difference between the antipodal _Fogrum

Japonicum_ and the _F. Americanum_, sufficiently common in our own

immediate neighborhood. Yet, with a becoming deference to the popular

belief that distinctions of this sort are enhanced in value by every

additional mile they travel, I have intermixed the names of some

tolerably distant literary and other associations with the rest.

I add here, also, an advertisement, which, that it may be the more

readily understood by those persons especially interested therein, I

have written in that curtailed and otherwise maltreated canine Latin, to

the writing and reading of which they are accustomed.

OMNIB. PER TOT. ORB. TERRAR. CATALOG. ACADEM, EDD.

Minim. gent, diplom. ab inclytiss. acad. vest. orans, vir. honorand.

operosiss., at sol. ut sciat. quant. glor. nom. meum (dipl. fort.

concess.) catal. vest. temp. futur. affer., ill. subjec., addit. omnib.

titul. honorar. qu. adh. non tant. opt. quam probab. put.

*** _Litt. Uncial, distinx. ut Præs. S. Hist. Nat. Jaal_.

HOMERUS WILBUR, Mr., Episc. Jaalam, S.T.D. 1850, et Yal. 1849, et

Neo-Cæs. et Brun. et Gulielm. 1852, et Gul. et Mar. et Bowd. et

Georgiop. et Viridimont. et Columb. Nov. Ebor. 1853, et Amherst. et

Watervill. et S. Jarlath. Hib. et S. Mar. et S. Joseph, et S. And. Scot.

1854. et Nashvill. et Dart. et Dickins. et Concord. et Wash. et

Columbian. et Charlest. et Jeff. et Dubl. et Oxon. et Cantab. et Cæt.

1855. P.U.N.C.H. et J.U.D. Gott. et Osnab. et Heidelb. 1860, et Acad.

BORE US. Berolin. Soc., et SS. RR. Lugd. Bat. et Patav. et Lond. et

Edinb. et Ins. Feejee. et Null. Terr. et Pekin. Soc. Hon. et S.H.S et

S.P.A. et A.A.S. et S. Humb. Univ. et S. Omn. Rer. Quarund. q. Aliar.

Promov. Passamaquod. et H.P.C. et I.O.H, et [Greek: A.D.Ph.] et

[Greek: P.K.P.] et [Greek: Ph.B.K.] et Peucin. et Erosoph. et

Philadelph. et Frat. in Unit. et [Greek: S.T.] et S. Archæolog.

Athen. et Acad. Scient, et Lit. Panorm. et SS.R.H. Matrit. et

Beeloochist. et Caffrar. et Caribb. et M.S. Reg. Paris, et S. Am.

Antiserv. Soc. Hon. et P.D. Gott. et LL.D. 1852, et D.C.L. et Mus. Doc.

Oxon. 1860, et M.M.S.S. et M.D. 1854, et Med. Fac. Univ. Harv. Soc. et

S. pro Convers. Pollywog. Soc. Hon. et Higgl. Piggl. et LL.B. 1853, et

S. pro Christianiz. Moschet. Soc. et SS. Ante-Diluv. ubiq. Gent. Soc.

Hon. et Civit. Cleric. Jaalam. et S. pro Diffus. General. Tenebr.

Secret. Corr.

INTRODUCTION

When, more than three years ago, my talented young parishioner, Mr.

Biglow, came to me and submitted to my animadversions the first of his

poems which he intended to commit to the more hazardous trial of a city

newspaper, it never so much as entered my imagination to conceive that

his productions would ever be gathered into a fair volume, and ushered

into the august presence of the reading public by myself.

So little are we short-sighted mortals able to predict the event! I

confess that there is to me a quite new satisfaction in being associated

(though only as sleeping partner) in a book which can stand by itself in

an independent unity on the shelves of libraries. For there is always

this drawback from the pleasure of printing a sermon, that, whereas the

queasy stomach of this generation will not bear a discourse long enough

to make a separate volume, those religious and godly-minded children

(those Samuels, if I may call them so) of the brain must at first be

buried in an undistinguished heap, and then get such resurrection as is

vouchsafed to them, mummy-wrapped with a score of others in a cheap

binding, with no other mark of distinction than the word

'_Miscellaneous_' printed upon the back. Far be it from me to claim any

credit for the quite unexpected popularity which I am pleased to find

these bucolic strains have attained unto. If I know myself, I am

measurably free from the itch of vanity; yet I may be allowed to say

that I was not backward to recognize in them a certain wild, puckery,

acidulous (sometimes even verging toward that point which, in our rustic

phrase, is termed _shut-eyed_) flavor, not wholly unpleasing, nor

unwholesome, to palates cloyed with the sugariness of tamed and

cultivated fruit. It may be, also, that some touches of my own, here and

there, may have led to their wider acceptance, albeit solely from my

larger experience of literature and authorship.[9]

I was at first inclined to discourage Mr. Biglow's attempts, as knowing

that the desire to poetize is one of the diseases naturally incident to

adolescence, which, if the fitting remedies be not at once and with a

bold hand applied, may become chronic, and render one, who might else

have become in due time an ornament of the social circle, a painful

object even to nearest friends and relatives. But thinking, on a further

experience that there was a germ of promise in him which required only

culture and the pulling up of weeds from about it, I thought it best to

set before him the acknowledged examples of English composition in

verse, and leave the rest to natural emulation. With this view, I

accordingly lent him some volumes of Pope and Goldsmith, to the

assiduous study of which he promised to devote his evenings. Not long

afterward, he brought me some verses written upon that model, a specimen

of which I subjoin, having changed some phrases of less elegancy, and a

few rhymes objectionable to the cultivated ear. The poem consisted of

childish reminiscences, and the sketches which follow will not seem

destitute of truth to those whose fortunate education began in a country

village. And, first, let us hang up his charcoal portrait of the

school-dame.

'Propped on the marsh, a dwelling now, I see

The humble school-house of my A, B, C,

Where well-drilled urchins, each behind his tire,

Waited in ranks the wished command to fire,

Then all together, when the signal came,

Discharged their _a-b abs_ against the dame.

Daughter of Danaus, who could daily pour

In treacherous pipkins her Pierian store,

She, mid the volleyed learning firm and calm,

Patted the furloughed ferule on her palm,

And, to our wonder, could divine at once

Who flashed the pan, and who was downright dunce.

'There young Devotion learned to climb with ease

The gnarly limbs of Scripture family-trees,

And he was most commended and admired

Who soonest to the topmost twig perspired;

Each name was called as many various ways

As pleased the reader's ear on different days,

So that the weather, or the ferule's stings,

Colds in the head, or fifty other things,

Transformed the helpless Hebrew thrice a week

To guttural Pequot or resounding Greek,

The vibrant accent skipping here and there,

Just as it pleased invention or despair;

No controversial Hebraist was the Dame;

With or without the points pleased her the same;

If any tyro found a name too tough.

And looked at her, pride furnished skill enough;

She nerved her larynx for the desperate thing,

And cleared the five-barred syllables at a spring.

'Ah, dear old times! there once it was my hap,

Perched on a stool, to wear the long-eared cap;

From books degraded, there I sat at ease,

A drone, the envy of compulsory bees;

Rewards of merit, too, full many a time,

Each with its woodcut and its moral rhyme,

And pierced half-dollars hung on ribbons gay

About my neck (to be restored next day)

I carried home, rewards as shining then

As those that deck the lifelong pains of men,

More solid than the redemanded praise

With which the world beribbons later days.

'Ah, dear old times! how brightly ye return!

How, rubbed afresh, your phosphor traces burn!

The ramble schoolward through dewsparkling meads,

The willow-wands turned Cinderella steeds,

The impromptu pin-bent hook, the deep remorse

O'er the chance-captured minnow's inchlong corse;

The pockets, plethoric with marbles round,

That still a space for ball and peg-top found,

Nor satiate yet, could manage to confine

Horsechestnuts, flagroot, and the kite's wound twine,

Nay, like the prophet's carpet could take in,

Enlarging still, the popgun's magazine;

The dinner carried in the small tin pail,

Shared with some dog, whose most beseeching tail

And dripping tongue and eager ears belied

The assumed indifference of canine pride;

The caper homeward, shortened if the cart

Of Neighbor Pomeroy, trundling from the mart,

O'ertook me,--then, translated to the seat

I praised the steed, how stanch he was and fleet,

While the bluff farmer, with superior grin,

Explained where horses should be thick, where thin,

And warned me (joke he always had in store)

To shun a beast that four white stockings wore.

What a fine natural courtesy was his!

His nod was pleasure, and his full bow bliss;

How did his well-thumbed hat, with ardor rapt,

Its curve decorous to each rank adapt!

How did it graduate with a courtly ease

The whole long scale of social differences,

Yet so gave each his measure running o'er,

None thought his own was less, his neighbor's more;

The squire was flattered, and the pauper knew

Old times acknowledged 'neath the threadbare blue!

Dropped at the corner of the embowered lane,

Whistling I wade the knee-deep leaves again,

While eager Argus, who has missed all day

The sharer of his condescending play,

Comes leaping onward with a bark elate

And boisterous tail to greet me at the gate;

That I was true in absence to our love

Let the thick dog's-ears in my primer prove.'

I add only one further extract, which will possess a melancholy interest

to all such as have endeavored to glean the materials of revolutionary

history from the lips of aged persons, who took a part in the actual

making of it, and, finding the manufacture profitable, continued the

supply in an adequate proportion to the demand.

'Old Joe is gone, who saw hot Percy goad

His slow artillery lip the Concord road,

A tale which grew in wonder, year by year,

As, every time he told it, Joe drew near

To the main fight, till, faded and grown gray,

The original scene to bolder tints gave way;

Then Joe had heard the foe's scared double-quick

Beat on stove drum with one un-captured stick,

And, ere death came the lengthening tale to lop,

Himself had fired, and seen a redcoat drop;

Had Joe lived long enough, that scrambling fight

Had squared more nearly with his sense of right,

And vanquished Percy, to complete the tale,

Had hammered stone for life in Concord jail.'

I do not know that the foregoing extracts ought not to be called my own

rather than Mr. Biglow's, as, indeed, he maintained stoutly that my file

had left nothing of his in them. I should not, perhaps, have felt

entitled to take so great liberties with them, had I not more than

suspected an hereditary vein of poetry in myself, a very near ancestor

having written a Latin poem in the Harvard _Gratulatio_ on the accession

of George the Third. Suffice it to say, that, whether not satisfied with

such limited approbation as I could conscientiously bestow, or from a

sense of natural inaptitude, certain it is that my young friend could

never be induced to any further essays in this kind. He affirmed that it

was to him like writing in a foreign tongue,--that Mr. Pope's

versification was like the regular ticking of one of Willard's clocks,

in which one could fancy, after long listening, a certain kind of rhythm

or tune, but which yet was only a poverty-stricken _tick, tick_, after

all,--and that he had never seen a sweet-water on a trellis growing so

fairly, or in forms so pleasing to his eye, as a fox-grape over a

scrub-oak in a swamp. He added I know not what, to the effect that the

sweet-water would only be the more disfigured by having its leaves

starched and ironed out, and that Pegasus (so he called him) hardly

looked right with his mane and tail in curl-papers. These and other such

opinions I did not long strive to eradicate, attributing them rather to

a defective education and senses untuned by too long familiarity with

purely natural objects, than to a perverted moral sense. I was the more

inclined to this leniency since sufficient evidence was not to seek,

that his verses, wanting as they certainly were in classic polish and

point, had somehow taken hold of the public ear in a surprising manner.

So, only setting him right as to the quantity of the proper name

Pegasus, I left him to follow the bent of his natural genius.

Yet could I not surrender him wholly to the tutelage of the pagan

(which, literally interpreted, signifies village) muse without yet a

further effort for his conversion, and to this end I resolved that

whatever of poetic fire yet burned in myself, aided by the assiduous

bellows of correct models, should be put in requisition. Accordingly,

when my ingenious young parishioner brought to my study a copy of verses

which he had written touching the acquisition of territory resulting

from the Mexican war, and the folly of leaving the question of slavery

or freedom to the adjudication of chance, I did myself indite a short

fable or apologue after the manner of Gay and Prior, to the end that he

might see how easily even such subjects as he treated of were capable of

a more refined style and more elegant expression. Mr. Biglow's

production was as follows:--

THE TWO GUNNERS

A FABLE

Two fellers, Isrel named and Joe,

One Sundy mornin' 'greed to go

Agunnin' soon 'z the bells wuz done

And meetin' finally begun,

So'st no one wouldn't be about

Ther Sabbath-breakin' to spy out.

Joe didn't want to go a mite;

He felt ez though 'twarn't skeercely right,

But, when his doubts he went to speak on,

Isrel he up and called him Deacon,

An' kep' apokin' fun like sin

An' then arubbin' on it in,

Till Joe, less skeered o' doin' wrong

Than bein' laughed at, went along.

Past noontime they went trampin' round

An' nary thing to pop at found,

Till, fairly tired o' their spree,

They leaned their guns agin a tree,

An' jest ez they wuz settin' down

To take their noonin', Joe looked roun'

And see (acrost lots in a pond

That warn't mor'n twenty rod beyond)

A goose that on the water sot

Ez ef awaitin' to be shot.

Isrel he ups and grabs his gun;

Sez he, 'By ginger, here's some fun!'

'Don't fire,' sez Joe, 'it ain't no use,

Thet's Deacon Peleg's tame wil'-goose:'

Sez Isrel, 'I don't care a cent.

I've sighted an' I'll let her went;'

_Bang!_ went queen's-arm, ole gander flopped

His wings a spell, an' quorked, an' dropped.

Sez Joe, 'I wouldn't ha' been hired

At that poor critter to ha' fired,

But since it's clean gin up the ghost,

We'll hev the tallest kind o' roast;

I guess our waistbands'll be tight

'Fore it comes ten o'clock ternight.'

'I won't agree to no such bender,'

Sez Isrel; 'keep it tell it's tender;

'Tain't wuth a snap afore it's ripe.'

Sez Joe, 'I'd jest ez lives eat tripe;

You _air_ a buster ter suppose

I'd eat what makes me hol' my nose!'

So they disputed to an' fro

Till cunnin' Isrel sez to Joe,

'Don't le's stay here an' play the fool,

Le's wait till both on us git cool,

Jest for a day or two le's hide it,

An' then toss up an' so decide it.'

'Agreed!' sez Joe, an' so they did,

An' the ole goose wuz safely hid.

Now 'twuz the hottest kind o' weather,

An' when at last they come together,

It didn't signify which won,

Fer all the mischief hed been done:

The goose wuz there, but, fer his soul,

Joe wouldn't ha' tetched it with a pole;

But Isrel kind o' liked the smell on 't

An' made _his_ dinner very well on 't.

My own humble attempt was in manner and form following, and I print it

here, I sincerely trust, out of no vainglory, but solely with the hope

of doing good.

LEAVING THE MATTER OPEN

A TALE

BY HOMER WILBUR, A.M.

Two brothers once, an ill-matched pair,

Together dwelt (no matter where),

To whom an Uncle Sam, or some one,

Had left a house and farm in common.

The two in principles and habits

Were different as rats from rabbits;

Stout Farmer North, with frugal care,

Laid up provision for his heir,

Not scorning with hard sun-browned hands

To scrape acquaintance with his lands;

Whatever thing he had to do

He did, and made it pay him, too;

He sold his waste stone by the pound,

His drains made water-wheels spin round,

His ice in summer-time he sold,

His wood brought profit when 'twas cold,

He dug and delved from morn till night,

Strove to make profit square with right,

Lived on his means, cut no great dash,

And paid his debts in honest cash.

On tother hand, his brother South

Lived very much from hand to mouth.

Played gentleman, nursed dainty hands,

Borrowed North's money on his lands,

And culled his morals and his graces

From cock-pits, bar-rooms, fights, and races;

His sole work in the farming line

Was keeping droves of long-legged swine,

Which brought great bothers and expenses

To North in looking after fences,

And, when they happened to break through,

Cost him both time and temper too,

For South insisted it was plain

He ought to drive them home again,

And North consented to the work

Because he loved to buy cheap pork.

Meanwhile, South's swine increasing fast;

His farm became too small at last;

So, having thought the matter over,

And feeling bound to live in clover

And never pay the clover's worth,

He said one day to Brother North:--

'Our families are both increasing,

And, though we labor without ceasing,

Our produce soon will be too scant

To keep our children out of want;

They who wish fortune to be lasting

Must be both prudent and forecasting;

We soon shall need more land; a lot

I know, that cheaply can be bo't;

You lend the cash, I'll buy the acres.

And we'll be equally partakers.'

Poor North, whose Anglo-Saxon blood

Gave him a hankering after mud,

Wavered a moment, then consented,

And, when the cash was paid, repented;

To make the new land worth a pin,

Thought he, it must be all fenced in,

For, if South's swine once get the run on 't

No kind of farming can be done on 't;

If that don't suit the other side,

'Tis best we instantly divide.'

But somehow South could ne'er incline

This way or that to run the line,

And always found some new pretence

'Gainst setting the division fence;

At last he said:--

'For peace's sake,

Liberal concessions I will make;

Though I believe, upon my soul,

I've a just title to the whole,

I'll make an offer which I call

Gen'rous,--we'll have no fence at all;

Then both of us, whene'er we choose,

Can take what part we want to use;

If you should chance to need it first,

Pick you the best, I'll take the worst.'

'Agreed!' cried North; thought he, This fall

With wheat and rye I'll sow it all;

In that way I shall get the start,

And South may whistle for his part.

So thought, so done, the field was sown,

And, winter haying come and gone,

Sly North walked blithely forth to spy,

The progress of his wheat and rye;

Heavens, what a sight! his brother's swine

Had asked themselves all out to dine;

Such grunting, munching, rooting, shoving,

The soil seemed all alive and moving,

As for his grain, such work they'd made on 't,

He couldn't spy a single blade on 't.

Off in a rage he rushed to South,

'My wheat and rye'--grief choked his mouth:

'Pray don't mind me,' said South, 'but plant

All of the new land that you want;'

'Yes, but your hogs,' cried North;

'The grain

Won't hurt them,' answered South again;

'But they destroy my crop;'

'No doubt;

'Tis fortunate you've found it out;

Misfortunes teach, and only they,

You must not sow it in their way;'

'Nay, you,' says North, 'must keep them out;'

'Did I create them with a snout?'

Asked South demurely; 'as agreed,

The land is open to your seed,

And would you fain prevent my pigs

From running there their harmless rigs?

God knows I view this compromise

With not the most approving eyes;

I gave up my unquestioned rights

For sake of quiet days and nights;

I offered then, you know 'tis true,

To cut the piece of land in two.'

'Then cut it now,' growls North;

'Abate

Your heat,' says South, 'tis now too late;

I offered you the rocky corner,

But you, of your own good the scorner,

Refused to take it: I am sorry;

No doubt you might have found a quarry,

Perhaps a gold-mine, for aught I know,

Containing heaps of native rhino;

You can't expect me to resign

My rights'--

'But where,' quoth North, 'are mine?'

'_Your_ rights,' says tother, 'well, that's funny,

_I_ bought the land'--

'_I_ paid the money;'

'That,' answered South, 'is from the point,

The ownership, you'll grant, is joint;

I'm sure my only hope and trust is

Not law so much as abstract justice,

Though, you remember, 'twas agreed

That so and so--consult the deed;

Objections now are out of date,

They might have answered once, but Fate

Quashes them at the point we've got to;

_Obsta principiis_ that's my motto.'

So saying, South began to whistle

And looked as obstinate as gristle,

While North went homeward, each brown paw

Clenched like a knot of natural law,

And all the while, in either ear,

Heard something clicking wondrous clear.

To turn now to other matters, there are two things upon which it should

seem fitting to dilate somewhat more largely in this place,--the Yankee

character and the Yankee dialect. And, first, of the Yankee character,

which has wanted neither open maligners, nor even more dangerous enemies

in the persons of those unskilful painters who have given to it that

hardness, angularity, and want of proper perspective, which, in truth,

belonged, not to their subject, but to their own niggard and unskilful

pencil.

New England was not so much the colony of a mother country, as a Hagar

driven forth into the wilderness. The little self-exiled band which came

hither in 1620 came, not to seek gold, but to found a democracy. They

came that they might have the privilege to work and pray, to sit upon

hard benches and listen to painful preachers as long as they would, yea,

even unto thirty-seventhly, if the spirit so willed it. And surely, if

the Greek might boast his Thermopylæ, where three hundred men fell in

resisting the Persian, we may well be proud of our Plymouth Rock, where

a handful of men, women, and children not merely faced, but vanquished,

winter, famine, the wilderness, and the yet more invincible _storge_

that drew them back to the green island far away. These found no lotus

growing upon the surly shore, the taste of which could make them forget

their little native Ithaca; nor were they so wanting to themselves in

faith as to burn their ship, but could see the fair west-wind belly the

homeward sail, and then turn unrepining to grapple with the terrible

Unknown.

As Want was the prime foe these hardy exodists had to fortress

themselves against, so it is little wonder if that traditional feud be

long in wearing out of the stock. The wounds of the old warfare were

long a-healing, and an east-wind of hard times puts a new ache into

every one of them. Thrift was the first lesson in their horn-book,

pointed out, letter after letter, by the lean finger of the hard

schoolmistress, Necessity. Neither were those plump, rosy-gilled

Englishmen that came hither, but a hard-faced, atrabilious, earnest-eyed

race, stiff from long wrestling with the Lord in prayer, and who had

taught Satan to dread the new Puritan hug. Add two hundred years'

influence of soil, climate, and exposure, with its necessary result of

idiosyncrasies, and we have the present Yankee, full of expedients,

half-master of all trades, inventive in all but the beautiful, full of

shifts, not yet capable of comfort, armed at all points against the old

enemy Hunger, longanimous, good at patching, not so careful for what is

best as for what will _do_, with a clasp to his purse and a button to

his pocket, not skilled to build against Time, as in old countries, but

against sore-pressing Need, accustomed to move the world with no [Greek:

pou sto] but his own two feet, and no lever but his own long forecast. A

strange hybrid, indeed, did circumstance beget, here in the New World,

upon the old Puritan stock, and the earth never before saw such

mystic-practicalism, such niggard-geniality, such

calculating-fanaticism, such cast-iron-enthusiasm, such

sour-faced-humor, such close-fisted-generosity. This new _Græculus

esuriens_ will make a living out of anything. He will invent new trades

as well as tools. His brain is his capital, and he will get education at

all risks. Put him on Juan Fernandez, and he would make a spelling-book

first, and a salt-pan afterward. _In coelum, jusseris, ibit_,--or the

other way either,--it is all one, so anything is to be got by it. Yet,

after all, thin, speculative Jonathan is more like the Englishman of two

centuries ago than John Bull himself is. He has lost somewhat in

solidity, has become fluent and adaptable, but more of the original

groundwork of character remains. He feels more at home with Fulke

Greville, Herbert of Cherbury, Quarles, George Herbert, and Browne, than

with his modern English cousins. He is nearer than John, by at least a

hundred years, to Naseby, Marston Moor, Worcester, and the time when, if

ever, there were true Englishmen. John Bull has suffered the idea of the

Invisible to be very much fattened out of him. Jonathan is conscious

still that he lives in the world of the Unseen as well as of the Seen.

To move John you must make your fulcrum of solid beef and pudding; an

abstract idea will do for Jonathan.

* * * * *

*** TO THE INDULGENT READER

My friend, the Rev. Mr. Wilbur, having been seized with a dangerous fit

of illness, before this Introduction had passed through the press, and

being incapacitated for all literary exertion, sent to me his notes,

memoranda, &c., and requested me to fashion them into some shape more

fitting for the general eye. This, owing to the fragmentary and

disjointed state of his manuscripts, I have felt wholly unable to do;

yet being unwilling that the reader should be deprived of such parts of

his lucubrations as seemed more finished, and not well discerning how to

segregate these from the rest, I have concluded to send them all to the

press precisely as they are.

COLUMBUS NYE,

_Pastor of a Church in Bungtown Corner._

It remains to speak of the Yankee dialect. And, first, it may be

premised, in a general way, that any one much read in the writings of

the early colonists need not be told that the far greater share of the

words and phrases now esteemed peculiar to New England, and local there,

were brought from the mother country. A person familiar with the

dialect of certain portions of Massachusetts will not fail to recognize,

in ordinary discourse, many words now noted in English vocabularies as

archaic, the greater part of which were in common use about the time of

the King James translation of the Bible. Shakespeare stands less in need

of a glossary to most New-Englanders than to many a native of the Old

Country. The peculiarities of our speech, however, are rapidly wearing

out. As there is no country where reading is so universal and newspapers

are so multitudinous, so no phrase remains long local, but is

transplanted in the mail-bags to every remotest corner of the land.

Consequently our dialect approaches nearer to uniformity than that of

any other nation.

The English have complained of us for coining new words. Many of those

so stigmatized were old ones by them forgotten, and all make now an

unquestioned part of the currency, wherever English is spoken.

Undoubtedly, we have a right to make new words, as they are needed by

the fresh aspects under which life presents itself here in the New

World; and, indeed, wherever a language is alive, it grows. It might be

questioned whether we could not establish a stronger title to the

ownership of the English tongue than the mother-islanders themselves.

Here, past all question, is to be its great home and centre. And not

only is it already spoken here by greater numbers, but with a far higher

popular average of correctness than in Britain. The great writers of it,

too, we might claim as ours, were ownership to be settled by the number

of readers and lovers.

As regards the provincialisms to be met with in this volume, I may say

that the reader will not find one which is not (as I believe) either

native or imported with the early settlers, nor one which I have not,

with my own ears, heard in familiar use. In the metrical portion of the

book, I have endeavored to adapt the spelling as nearly as possible to

the ordinary mode of pronunciation. Let the reader who deems me

over-particular remember this caution of Martial:--

'Quem recitas, meus est, O Fidentine, libellus;

Sed male cum recitas, incipit esse tuus.'

A few further explanatory remarks will not be impertinent.

I shall barely lay down a few general rules for the reader's guidance.

1. The genuine Yankee never gives the rough sound to the _r_ when he can

help it, and often displays considerable ingenuity in avoiding it even

before a vowel.

2. He seldom sounds the final _g_, a piece of self-denial, if we

consider his partiality for nasals. The same of the final _d_, as _han'_

and _stan'_ for _hand_ and _stand_.

3. The _h_ in such words as _while, when, where,_ he omits altogether.

4. In regard to _a_, he shows some inconsistency, sometimes giving a

close and obscure sound, as _hev_ for _have, hendy_ for _handy, ez_ for

_as, thet_ for _that_, and again giving it the broad sound it has in

_father_, as _hânsome_ for _handsome._

5. To the sound _ou_ he prefixes an _e_ (hard to exemplify otherwise

than orally).

The following passage in Shakespeare he would recite thus:--

'Neow is the winta uv eour discontent

Med glorious summa by this sun o'Yock,

An' all the cleouds thet leowered upun eour heouse

In the deep buzzum o' the oshin buried;

Neow air eour breows beound 'ith victorious wreaths;

Eour breused arms hung up fer monimunce;

Eour starn alarums changed to merry meetins,

Eour dreffle marches to delighfle masures.

Grim-visaged war heth smeuthed his wrinkled front,

An' neow, instid o' mountin' bare-bid steeds

To fright the souls o' ferfle edverseries,

He capers nimly in a lady's chămber,

To the lascivious pleasin' uv a loot.'

6. _Au_, in such words as _daughter_ and _slaughter_, he pronounces

_ah_.

7. To the dish thus seasoned add a drawl _ad libitum_.

[Mr. Wilbur's notes here become entirely fragmentary.--C.N.]

[Greek: a]. Unable to procure a likeness of Mr. Biglow, I thought the

curious reader might be gratified with a sight of the editorial

effigies. And here a choice between two was offered,--the one a profile

(entirely black) cut by Doyle, the other a portrait painted by a native

artist of much promise. The first of these seemed wanting in expression,

and in the second a slight obliquity of the visual organs has been

heightened (perhaps from an over-desire of force on the part of the

artist) into too close an approach to actual _strabismus_. This slight

divergence in my optical apparatus from the ordinary model--however I

may have been taught to regard it in the light of a mercy rather than a

cross, since it enabled me to give as much of directness and personal

application to my discourses as met the wants of my congregation,

without risk of offending any by being supposed to have him or her in my

eye (as the saying is)--seemed yet to Mrs. Wilbur a sufficient objection

to the engraving of the aforesaid painting. We read of many who either

absolutely refused to allow the copying of their features, as especially

did Plotinus and Agesilaus among the ancients, not to mention the more

modern instances of Scioppius, Palæottus, Pinellus, Velserus, Gataker,

and others, or were indifferent thereto, as Cromwell.

[Greek: b.] Yet was Cæsar desirous of concealing his baldness. _Per

contra_, my Lord Protector's carefulness in the matter of his wart might

be cited. Men generally more desirous of being _improved_ in their

portraits than characters. Shall probably find very unflattered

likenesses of ourselves in Recording Angel's gallery.

[Greek: g.] Whether any of our national peculiarities may be traced to

our use of stoves, as a certain closeness of the lips in pronunciation,

and a smothered smoulderingness of disposition seldom roused to open

flame? An unrestrained intercourse with fire probably conducive to

generosity and hospitality of soul. Ancient Mexicans used stoves, as the

friar Augustin Ruiz reports, Hakluyt, III. 468,--but Popish priests not

always reliable authority.

To-day picked my Isabella grapes. Crop injured by attacks of rose-bug in

the spring. Whether Noah was justifiable in preserving this class of

insects?

[Greek: d]. Concerning Mr. Biglow's pedigree. Tolerably certain that

there was never a poet among his ancestors. An ordination hymn

attributed to a maternal uncle, but perhaps a sort of production not

demanding the creative faculty.

His grandfather a painter of the grandiose or Michael Angelo school.

Seldom painted objects smaller than houses or barns, and these with

uncommon expression.

[Greek: e]. Of the Wilburs no complete pedigree. The crest said to be a

_wild boar_, whence, perhaps, the name. (?) A connection with the Earls

of Wilbraham (_quasi_ wild boar ham) might be made out. This suggestion

worth following up. In 1677, John W.m. Expect----, had issue, 1. John,

2. Haggai, 3. Expect, 4. Ruhamah, 5. Desire.

'Here lyes y'e bodye of Mrs. Expect Wilber,

Ye crewell salvages they kil'd her

Together w'th other Christian soles eleaven,

October y'e ix daye, 1707.

Y'e stream of Jordan sh' as crost ore

And now expeacts me on y'e other shore:

I live in hope her soon to join;

Her earthlye yeeres were forty and nine.'

_From Gravestone in Pekussett, North Parish._

This is unquestionably the same John who afterward (1711) married

Tabitha Hagg or Ragg.

But if this were the case, she seems to have died early; for only three

years after, namely, 1714, we have evidence that he married Winifred,

daughter of Lieutenant Tipping.

He seems to have been a man of substance, for we find him in 1696

conveying 'one undivided eightieth part of a salt-meadow' in Yabbok, and

he commanded a sloop in 1702.

Those who doubt the importance of genealogical studies _fuste potius

quam argumento erudiendi_.

I trace him as far as 1723, and there lose him. In that year he was

chosen selectman.

No gravestone. Perhaps overthrown when new hearse-house was built, 1802.

He was probably the son of John, who came from Bilham Comit. Salop.

circa 1642.

This first John was a man of considerable importance, being twice

mentioned with the honorable prefix of _Mr._ in the town records. Name

spelt with two _l-s_.

'Hear lyeth y'e bod [_stone unhappily broken_.]

Mr. Ihon Wilber [Esq.] [_I inclose this in brackets as doubtful.

To me it seems clear_.]

Ob't die [_illegible; looks like xviii_.].... iii [_prob. 1693_.]

... paynt

... deseased seinte:

A friend and [fath]er untoe all y'e opreast,

Hee gave y'e wicked familists noe reast,

When Sat[an bl]ewe his Antinomian blaste.

Wee clong to [Willber as a steadf]ast maste.

[A]gaynst y'e horrid Qua[kers] ...'

It is greatly to be lamented that this curious epitaph is mutilated. It

is said that the sacrilegious British soldiers made a target of the

stone during the war of Independence. How odious an animosity which

pauses not at the grave! How brutal that which spares not the monuments

of authentic history! This is not improbably from the pen of Rev. Moody

Pyram, who is mentioned by Hubbard as having been noted for a silver

vein of poetry. If his papers be still extant, a copy might possibly be

recovered.

THE BIGLOW PAPERS

No. I

A LETTER

FROM MR. EZEKIEL BIGLOW OF JAALAM TO THE HON. JOSEPH T. BUCKINGHAM,

EDITOR OF THE BOSTON COURIER, INCLOSING A POEM OF HIS SON, MR. HOSEA

BIGLOW

JAYLEM, june 1846.

MISTER EDDYTER:--Our Hosea wuz down to Boston last week, and he see a

cruetin Sarjunt a struttin round as popler as a hen with 1 chicking,

with 2 fellers a drummin and fifin arter him like all nater. the sarjunt

he thout Hosea hedn't gut his i teeth cut cos he looked a kindo 's

though he'd jest com down, so he cal'lated to hook him in, but Hosy

woodn't take none o' his sarse for all he hed much as 20 Rooster's tales

stuck onto his hat and eenamost enuf brass a bobbin up and down on his

shoulders and figureed onto his coat and trousis, let alone wut nater

hed sot in his featers, to make a 6 pounder out on.

wal, Hosea he com home considerabal riled, and arter I'd gone to bed I

heern Him a thrashin round like a short-tailed Bull in fli-time. The old

Woman ses she to me ses she, Zekle, ses she, our Hosee's gut the

chollery or suthin anuther ses she, don't you Bee skeered, ses I, he's

oney amakin pottery[10] ses i, he's ollers on hand at that ere busynes

like Da & martin, and shure enuf, cum mornin, Hosy he cum down stares

full chizzle, hare on eend and cote tales flyin, and sot rite of to go

reed his varses to Parson Wilbur bein he haint aney grate shows o' book

larnin himself, bimeby he cum back and sed the parson wuz dreffle

tickled with 'em as i hoop you will Be, and said they wuz True grit.

Hosea ses taint hardly fair to call 'em hisn now, cos the parson kind o'

slicked off sum o' the last varses, but he told Hosee he didn't want to

put his ore in to tetch to the Rest on 'em, bein they wuz verry well As

thay wuz, and then Hosy ses he sed suthin a nuther about Simplex

Mundishes or sum sech feller, but I guess Hosea kind o' didn't hear him,

for I never hearn o' nobody o' that name in this villadge, and I've

lived here man and boy 76 year cum next tater diggin, and thair aint no

wheres a kitting spryer 'n I be.

If you print 'em I wish you'd jest let folks know who hosy's father is,

cos my ant Keziah used to say it's nater to be curus ses she, she aint

livin though and he's a likely kind o' lad.

EZEKIEL BIGLOW.

* * * * *

Thrash away, you'll _hev_ to rattle

On them kittle-drums o' yourn,--

'Taint a knowin' kind o' cattle

Thet is ketched with mouldy corn;

Put in stiff, you fifer feller,

Let folks see how spry you be,--

Guess you'll toot till you are yeller

'Fore you git ahold o' me!

Thet air flag's a leetle rotten,

Hope it aint your Sunday's best;-- 10

Fact! it takes a sight o' cotton

To stuff out a soger's chest:

Sence we farmers hev to pay fer't,

Ef you must wear humps like these,

S'posin' you should try salt hay fer't,

It would du ez slick ez grease.

'Twouldn't suit them Southun fellers,

They're a dreffle graspin' set,

We must ollers blow the bellers

Wen they want their irons het; 20

May be it's all right ez preachin',

But _my_ narves it kind o' grates,

Wen I see the overreachin'

O' them nigger-drivin' States.

Them thet rule us, them slave-traders,

Haint they cut a thunderin' swarth

(Helped by Yankee renegaders),

Thru the vartu o' the North!

We begin to think it's nater

To take sarse an' not be riled;-- 30

Who'd expect to see a tater

All on eend at bein' biled?

Ez fer war, I call it murder,--

There you hev it plain an' flat;

I don't want to go no furder

Than my Testyment fer that;

God hez sed so plump an' fairly,

It's ez long ez it is broad,

An' you've gut to git up airly

Ef you want to take in God. 40

'Taint your eppyletts an' feathers

Make the thing a grain more right;

'Taint afollerin' your bell-wethers

Will excuse ye in His sight;

Ef you take a sword an' dror it,

An' go stick a feller thru,

Guv'ment aint to answer for it,

God'll send the bill to you.

Wut's the use o' meetin'-goin'

Every Sabbath, wet or dry, 50

Ef it's right to go amowin'

Feller-men like oats an' rye?

I dunno but wut it's pooty

Trainin' round in bobtail coats,--

But it's curus Christian dooty

This 'ere cuttin' folks's throats.

They may talk o' Freedom's airy

Tell they're pupple in the face,--

It's a grand gret cemetary

Fer the barthrights of our race; 60

They jest want this Californy

So's to lug new slave-states in

To abuse ye, an' to scorn ye,

An' to plunder ye like sin.

Aint it cute to see a Yankee

Take sech everlastin' pains,

All to get the Devil's thankee

Helpin' on 'em weld their chains?

Wy, it's jest ez clear ez figgers,

Clear ez one an' one make two, 70

Chaps thet make black slaves o' niggers

Want to make wite slaves o' you.

Tell ye jest the eend I've come to

Arter cipherin' plaguy smart,

An' it makes a handy sum, tu.

Any gump could larn by heart;

Laborin' man an' laborin' woman

Hev one glory an' one shame.

Ev'y thin' thet's done inhuman

Injers all on 'em the same. 80

'Taint by turnln' out to hack folks

You're agoin' to git your right,

Nor by lookin' down on black folks

Coz you're put upon by wite;

Slavery aint o' nary color,

'Taint the hide thet makes it wus,

All it keers fer in a feller

'S jest to make him fill its pus.

Want to tackle _me_ in, du ye?

I expect you'll hev to wait; 90

Wen cold lead puts daylight thru ye

You'll begin to kal'late;

S'pose the crows wun't fall to pickin'

All the carkiss from your bones,

Coz you helped to give a lickin'

To them poor half-Spanish drones?

Jest go home an' ask our Nancy

Wether I'd be sech a goose

Ez to jine ye,--guess you'd fancy

The etarnal bung wuz loose! 100

She wants me fer home consumption,

Let alone the hay's to mow,--

Ef you're arter folks o' gumption,

You've a darned long row to hoe.

Take them editors thet's crowin'

Like a cockerel three months old,--

Don't ketch any on 'em goin

Though they _be_ so blasted bold;

_Aint_ they a prime lot o' fellers?

'Fore they think on 't guess they'll sprout 110

(Like a peach thet's got the yellers),

With the meanness bustin' out.

Wal, go 'long to help 'em stealin'

Bigger pens to cram with slaves,

Help the men thet's ollers dealin'

Insults on your fathers' graves;

Help the strong to grind the feeble,

Help the many agin the few,

Help the men thet call your people

Witewashed slaves an' peddlin' crew! 120

Massachusetts, God forgive her,

She's akneelin' with the rest,

She, thet ough' to ha' clung ferever

In her grand old eagle-nest;

She thet ough' to stand so fearless

W'ile the wracks are round her hurled,

Holdin' up a beacon peerless

To the oppressed of all the world!

Ha'n't they sold your colored seamen?

Ha'n't they made your env'ys w'iz? 130

_Wut_'ll make ye act like freemen?

_Wut_'ll git your dander riz?

Come, I'll tell ye wut I'm thinkin'

Is our dooty in this fix.

They'd ha' done 't ez quick ez winkin'

In the days o' seventy-six.

Clang the bells in every steeple,

Call all true men to disown

The tradoocers of our people,

The enslavers o' their own; 140

Let our dear old Bay State proudly

Put the trumpet to her mouth,

Let her ring this messidge loudly

In the ears of all the South:--

'I'll return ye good fer evil

Much ez we frail mortils can,

But I wun't go help the Devil

Makin' man the cuss o' man;

Call me coward, call me traiter,

Jest ez suits your mean idees,--

Here I stand a tyrant hater, 151

An' the friend o' God an' Peace!'

Ef I'd _my_ way I hed ruther

We should go to work an part,

They take one way, we take t'other,

Guess it wouldn't break my heart;

Man hed ough' to put asunder

Them thet God has noways jined;

An' I shouldn't gretly wonder

Ef there's thousands o' my mind. 160

[The first recruiting sergeant on record I conceive to have been that

individual who is mentioned in the Book of Job as _going to and fro in

the earth, and walking up and down in it._ Bishop Latimer will have him

to have been a bishop, but to me that other calling would appear more

congenial. The sect of Cainites is not yet extinct, who esteemed the

first-born of Adam to be the most worthy, not only because of that

privilege of primogeniture, but inasmuch as he was able to overcome and

slay his younger brother. That was a wise saying of the famous Marquis

Pescara to the Papal Legate, that _it was impossible for men to serve

Mars and Christ at the same time_. Yet in time past the profession of

arms was judged to be [Greek: kat exochaen] that of a gentleman, nor

does this opinion want for strenuous upholders even in our day. Must we

suppose, then, that the profession of Christianity was only intended for

losels, or, at best, to afford an opening for plebeian ambition? Or

shall we hold with that nicely metaphysical Pomeranian, Captain Vratz,

who was Count Königsmark's chief instrument in the murder of Mr. Thynne,

that the Scheme of Salvation has been arranged with an especial eye to

the necessities of the upper classes, and that 'God would consider a

_gentleman_ and deal with him suitably to the condition and profession

he had placed him in'? It may be said of us all, _Exemplo plus quam

ratione vivimus_.--H.W.]

No. II

A LETTER

FROM MR. HOSEA BIGLOW TO THE HON. J.T. BUCKINGHAM, EDITOR OF THE BOSTON

COURIER, COVERING A LETTER FROM MR. B. SAWIN, PRIVATE IN THE

MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENT

[This letter of Mr. Sawin's was not originally written in verse. Mr.

Biglow, thinking it peculiarly susceptible of metrical adornment,

translated it, so to speak, into his own vernacular tongue. This is not

the time to consider the question, whether rhyme be a mode of expression

natural to the human race. If leisure from other and more important

avocations be granted, I will handle the matter more at large in an

appendix to the present volume. In this place I will barely remark, that

I have sometimes noticed in the unlanguaged prattlings of infants a

fondness for alliteration, assonance, and even rhyme, in which natural

predisposition we may trace the three degrees through which our

Anglo-Saxon verse rose to its culmination in the poetry of Pope. I would

not be understood as questioning in these remarks that pious theory

which supposes that children, if left entirely to themselves, would

naturally discourse in Hebrew. For this the authority of one experiment

is claimed, and I could, with Sir Thomas Browne, desire its

establishment, inasmuch as the acquirement of that sacred tongue would

thereby be facilitated. I am aware that Herodotus states the conclusion

of Psammetieus to have been in favor of a dialect of the Phrygian. But,

beside the chance that a trial of this importance would hardly be

blessed to a Pagan monarch whose only motive was curiosity, we have on

the Hebrew side the comparatively recent investigation of James the

Fourth of Scotland. I will add to this prefatory remark, that Mr. Sawin,

though a native of Jaalam, has never been a stated attendant on the

religious exercises of my congregation. I consider my humble efforts

prospered in that not one of my sheep hath ever indued the wolf's

clothing of war, save for the comparatively innocent diversion of a

militia training. Not that my flock are backward to undergo the

hardships of _defensive_ warfare. They serve cheerfully in the great

army which fights, even unto death _pro aris et focis_, accoutred with

the spade, the axe, the plane, the sledge, the spelling-book, and other

such effectual weapons against want and ignorance and unthrift. I have

taught them (under God) to esteem our human institutions as but tents of

a night, to be stricken whenever Truth puts the bugle to her lips and

sounds a march to the heights of wider-viewed intelligence and more

perfect organization.--H.W.]

MISTER BUCKINUM, the follerin Billet was writ hum by a Yung feller of

our town that wuz cussed fool enuff to goe atrottin inter Miss Chiff

arter a Drum and fife, it ain't Nater for a feller to let on that he's

sick o' any bizness that He went intu off his own free will and a Cord,

but I rather cal'late he's middlin tired o' voluntearin By this Time. I

bleeve u may put dependunts on his statemence. For I never heered nothin

bad on him let Alone his havin what Parson Wilbur cals a _pong shong_

for cocktales, and he ses it wuz a soshiashun of idees sot him agoin

arter the Crootin Sargient cos he wore a cocktale onto his hat.

his Folks gin the letter to me and i shew it to parson Wilbur and he ses

it oughter Bee printed. send It to mister Buckinum, ses he, i don't

ollers agree with him, ses he, but by Time,[11] ses he, I _du_ like a

feller that aint a Feared.

I have intusspussed a Few refleckshuns hear and thar. We're a kind

o'prest with Hayin.

Ewers respecfly

HOSEA BIGLOW.

This kind o' sogerin' aint a mite like our October trainin',

A chap could clear right out from there ef 't only looked like rainin',

An' th' Cunnles, tu, could kiver up their shappoes with bandanners,

An' send the insines skootin' to the bar-room with their banners

(Fear o' gittin' on 'em spotted), an' a feller could cry quarter

Ef he fired away his ramrod arter tu much rum an' water.

Recollect wut fun we hed, you 'n' I an' Ezry Hollis,

Up there to Waltham plain last fall, along o' the Cornwallis?[12]

This sort o' thing aint _jest_ like thet,--I wish thet I wuz furder,[13]--

Ninepunce a day fer killin' folks comes kind o' low fer murder, 10

(Wy I've worked out to slarterin' some fer Deacon Cephas Billins,

An' in the hardest times there wuz I ollers tetched ten shillins.)

There's sutthin' gits into my throat thet makes it hard to swaller,

It comes so naturel to think about a hempen collar;

It's glory,--but, in spite o' all my tryin' to git callous,

I feel a kind o' in a cart, aridin' to the gallus.

But wen it comes to _bein'_ killed,--I tell ye I felt streaked

The fust time 't ever I found out wy baggonets wuz peaked;

Here's how it wuz: I started out to go to a fandango,

The sentinul he ups an' sez, 'Thet's furder 'an you can go.' 20

'None o' your sarse,' sez I; sez he, 'Stan' back!' 'Aint you a buster?'

Sez I, 'I'm up to all thet air, I guess I've ben to muster;

I know wy sentinuls air sot; you aint agoin' to eat us;

Caleb haint no monopoly to court the seenorcetas;

My folks to hum air full ez good ez his'n be, by golly!'

An' so ez I wuz goin' by, not thinkin' wut would folly,

The everlastin' cus he stuck his one-pronged pitchfork in me

An' made a hole right thru my close ez ef I wuz an in'my.

Wal, it beats all how big I felt hoorawin' in ole Funnel

Wen Mister Bolles he gin the sword to our Leftenant Cunnle, 30

(It's Mister Secondary Bolles,[14] thet writ the prize peace essay.

Thet's wy he didn't list himself along o' us, I dessay,)

An' Rantoul, tu, talked pooty loud, but don't put _his_ foot in it,

Coz human life's so sacred thet he's principled agin it,--

Though I myself can't rightly see it's any wus achokin' on 'em;

Than puttin' bullets thru their lights, or with a bagnet pokin' on 'em;

How dreffle slick he reeled it off (like Blitz at our lyceum

Ahaulin' ribbins from his chops so quick you skeercely see 'em),

About the Anglo-Saxon race (an' saxons would be handy

To du the buryin' down here upon the Rio Grandy), 40

About our patriotic pas an' our star-spangled banner,

Our country's bird alookin' on an' singin' out hosanner,

An' how he (Mister B. himself) wuz happy fer Ameriky,--

I felt, ez sister Patience sez, a leetle mite histericky.

I felt, I swon, ez though it wuz a dreffle kind o' privilege

Atrampin' round thru Boston streets among the gutter's drivelage;

I act'lly thought it wuz a treat to hear a little drummin',

An' it did bonyfidy seem millanyum wuz acomin'

Wen all on us got suits (darned like them wore in the state prison)

An' every feller felt ez though all Mexico wuz hisn.[15] 50

This 'ere's about the meanest place a skunk could wal dlskiver

(Saltillo's Mexican, I b'lieve, fer wut we call Salt-river);

The sort o' trash a feller gits to eat doos beat all nater,

I'd give a year's pay fer a smell o' one good blue-nose tater,

The country here thet Mister Bolles declared to be so charmin'

Throughout is swarmin' with the most alarmin' kind o' varmin.

He talked about delishis froots, but then it wuz a wopper all,

The holl on 't 's mud an' prickly pears, with here an' there a chapparal;

You see a feller peekin' out, an', fust you know, a lariat

Is round your throat an' you a copse, 'fore you can say, 'Wut air ye

at?'[16] 60

You never see sech darned gret bugs (it may not be irrelevant

To say I've seen a _scarabæus pilularius_[17] big ez a year old elephant),

The rigiment come up one day in time to stop a red bug

From runnin off with Cunnle Wright,--'twuz jest a common _cimex

lectularius._

One night I started up on eend an' thought I wuz to hum agin,

I heern a horn, thinks I it's Sol the fisherman hez come agin,

_His_ bellowses is sound enough,--ez I'm a livin' creeter,

I felt a thing go thru my leg--'twuz nothin' more 'n a skeeter!

Then there's the yaller fever, tu, they call it here el vomito,--

(Come, thet wun't du, you landcrab there, I tell ye to le' _go_ my

toe! 70

My gracious! it's a scorpion thet's took a shine to play with 't,

I darsn't skeer the tarnal thing fer fear he'd run away with 't,)

Afore I come away from hum I hed a strong persuasion

Thet Mexicans worn't human beans,[18]--an ourang outang nation,

A sort o' folks a chap could kill an' never dream on 't arter,

No more 'n a feller'd dream o' pigs thet he hed hed to slarter;

I'd an idee thet they were built arter the darkie fashion all,

An' kickin' colored folks about, you know 's a kind o' national;

But wen I jined I worn't so wise ez thet air queen o' Sheby,

Fer, come to look at 'em, they aint much diff'rent from wut we be, 80

An' here we air ascrougin' 'em out o' thir own dominions,

Ashelterin' 'em, ez Caleb sez, under our eagle's pinions,

Wich means to take a feller up jest by the slack o' 's trowsis

An' walk him Spanish clean right out o' all his homes an' houses;

Wal, it doos seem a curus way, but then hooraw fer Jackson!

It must be right, fer Caleb sez it's reg'lar Anglo-Saxon,

The Mex'cans don't fight fair, they say, they piz'n all the water,

An' du amazin' lots o' things thet isn't wut they ough' to;

Bein' they haint no lead, they make their bullets out o' copper

An' shoot the darned things at us, tu, wich Caleb sez ain

proper; 90

He sez they'd ough' to stan' right up an' let us pop 'em fairly

(Guess wen he ketches 'em at thet he'll hev to git up airly),

Thet our nation's bigger 'n theirn an' so its rights air bigger,

An' thet it's all to make 'em free thet we air pullin' trigger,

Thet Anglo Saxondom's idee's abreakin' 'em to pieces,

An' thet idee's thet every man doos jest wut he damn pleases;

Ef I don't make his meanin' clear, perhaps in some respex I can,

I know thet 'every man' don't mean a nigger or a Mexican;

An' there's another thing I know, an' thet is, ef these creeters,

Thet stick an Anglosaxon mask onto State-prison feeturs, 100

Should come to Jaalam Centre fer to argify an' spout on 't,

The gals 'ould count the silver spoons the minnit they cleared out on 't.

This goin' ware glory waits ye haint one agreeable feetur,

An' ef it worn't fer wakin' snakes, I'd home agin short meter;

O, wouldn't I be off, quick time, ef 't worn't thet I wuz sartin

They'd let the daylight into me to pay me fer desartin!

I don't approve o' tellin' tales, but jest to you I may state

Our ossifers aiut wut they wuz afore they left the Bay-state;

Then it wuz 'Mister Sawin, sir, you're middlin' well now, be ye?

Step up an' take a nipper, sir; I'm dreffle glad to see ye:' 110

But now it's 'Ware's my eppylet? here, Sawin, step an' fetch it!

An' mind your eye, be thund'rin' spry, or, damn ye, you shall ketch it!'

Wal, ez the Doctor sez, some pork will bile so, but by mighty,

Ef I hed some on 'em to hum, I'd give 'em linkum vity,

I'd play the rogue's march on their hides an' other music follerin'--

But I must close my letter here, fer one on 'em 's ahollerin',

These Anglosaxon ossifers,--wal, taint no use ajawin',

I'm safe enlisted fer the war,

Yourn,

BIRDOFREDOM SAWIN.

[Those have not been wanting (as, indeed, when hath Satan been to seek

for attorneys?) who have maintained that our late inroad upon Mexico was

undertaken not so much for the avenging of any national quarrel, as for

the spreading of free institutions and of Protestantism. _Capita vix

duabus Anticyris medenda!_ Verily I admire that no pious sergeant among

these new Crusaders beheld Martin Luther riding at the front of the host

upon a tamed pontifical bull, as, in that former invasion of Mexico, the

zealous Gomara (spawn though he were of the Scarlet Woman) was favored

with a vision of St. James of Compostella, skewering the infidels upon

his apostolical lance. We read, also, that Richard of the lion heart,

having gone to Palestine on a similar errand of mercy, was divinely

encouraged to cut the throats of such Paynims as refused to swallow the

bread of life (doubtless that they might be thereafter incapacitated for

swallowing the filthy gobbets of Mahound) by angels of heaven, who cried

to the king and his knights,_--Seigneurs, tuez! tuez!_ providentially

using the French tongue, as being the only one understood by their

auditors. This would argue for the pantoglottism of these celestial

intelligences, while, on the other hand, the Devil, _teste_ Cotton

Mather, is unversed in certain of the Indian dialects. Yet must he be a

semeiologist the most expert, making himself intelligible to every

people and kindred by signs; no other discourse, indeed, being needful,

than such as the mackerel-fisher holds with his finned quarry, who, if

other bait be wanting, can by a bare bit of white rag at the end of a

string captivate those foolish fishes. Such piscatorial persuasion is

Satan cunning in. Before one he trails a hat and feather, or a bare

feather without a hat; before another, a Presidential chair or a

tide-waiter's stool, or a pulpit in the city, no matter what. To us,

dangling there over our heads, they seem junkets dropped out of the

seventh heaven, sops dipped in nectar, but, once in our mouths, they are

all one, bits of fuzzy cotton.

This, however, by the way. It is time now _revocare gradum_. While so

many miracles of this sort, vouched by eye-witnesses, have encouraged

the arms of Papists, not to speak of Echetlæus at Marathon and those

_Dioscuri_ (whom we must conclude imps of the pit) who sundry times

captained the pagan Roman soldiery, it is strange that our first

American crusade was not in some such wise also signalized. Yet it is

said that the Lord hath manifestly prospered our armies. This opens the

question, whether, when our hands are strengthened to make great

slaughter of our enemies, it be absolutely and demonstratively certain

that this might is added to us from above, or whether some Potentate

from an opposite quarter may not have a finger in it, as there are few

pies into which his meddling digits are not thrust. Would the Sanctifier

and Setter-apart of the seventh day have assisted in a victory gained on

the Sabbath, as was one in the late war? Do we not know from Josephus,

that, careful of His decree, a certain river in Judaea abstained from

flowing on the day of Rest? Or has that day become less an object of His

especial care since the year 1697, when so manifest a providence

occurred to Mr. William Trowbridge, in answer to whose prayers, when he

and all on shipboard with him were starving, a dolphin was sent daily,

'which was enough to serve 'em; only on _Saturdays_ they still catched a

couple, and on the _Lord's Days_ they could catch none at all'? Haply

they might have been permitted, by way of mortification, to take some

few sculpins (those banes of the salt-water angler), which unseemly fish

would, moreover, have conveyed to them a symbolical reproof for their

breach of the day, being known in the rude dialect of our mariners as

_Cape Cod Clergymen_.

It has been a refreshment to many nice consciences to know that our

Chief Magistrate would not regard with eyes of approval the (by many

esteemed) sinful pastime of dancing, and I own myseif to be so far of

that mind, that I could not but set my face against this Mexican Polka,

though danced to the Presidential piping with a Gubernatorial second. If

ever the country should be seized with another such mania _pro

propaganda fide_, I think it would be wise to fill our bombshells with

alternate copies of the Cambridge Platform and the Thirty-nine Articles,

which would produce a mixture of the highest explosive power, and to

wrap every one of our cannon-balls in a leaf of the New Testament, the

reading of which is denied to those who sit in the darkness of Popery.

Those iron evangelists would thus be able to disseminate vital religion

and Gospel truth in quarters inaccessible to the ordinary missionary. I

have seen lads, unimpregnate with the more sublimated punctiliousness of

Walton, secure pickerel, taking their unwary _siesta_ beneath the

lily-pads too nigh the surface, with a gun and small shot. Why not,

then, since gunpowder was unknown in the time of the Apostles (not to

enter here upon the question whether it were discovered before that

period by the Chinese), suit our metaphor to the age in which we live,

and say _shooters_ as well as _fishers_ of men?

I do much fear that we shall be seized now and then with a Protestant

fervor, as long as we have neighbor Naboths whose wallowings in

Papistical mire excite our horror in exact proportion to the size and

desirableness of their vineyards. Yet I rejoice that some earnest

Protestants have been made by this war,--I mean those who protested

against it. Fewer they were than I could wish, for one might imagine

America to have been colonized by a tribe of those nondescript African

animals the Aye-Ayes, so difficult a word is _No_ to us all. There is

some malformation or defect of the vocal organs, which either prevents

our uttering it at all, or gives it so thick a pronunciation as to be

unintelligible. A mouth filled with the national pudding, or watering in

expectation thereof, is wholly incompetent to this refractory

monosyllable. An abject and herpetic Public Opinion is the Pope, the

Anti-Christ, for us to protest against _e corde cordium_. And by what

College of Cardinals is this our God's-vicar, our binder and looser,

elected? Very like, by the sacred conclave of Tag, Rag, and Bobtail, in

the gracious atmosphere of the grog-shop. Yet it is of this that we must

all be puppets. This thumps the pulpit-cushion, this guides the editor's

pen, this wags the senator's tongue. This decides what Scriptures are

canonical, and shuffles Christ away into the Apocrypha. According to

that sentence fathered upon Solon, [Greek: Onto daemosion kakon erchetai

oikad ekasto] This unclean spirit is skilful to assume various shapes. I

have known it to enter my own study and nudge my elbow of a Saturday,

under the semblance of a wealthy member of my congregation. It were a

great blessing, if every particular of what in the sum we call popular

sentiment could carry about the name of its manufacturer stamped legibly

upon it. I gave a stab under the fifth rib to that pestilent

fallacy,--'Our country, right or wrong,'--by tracing its original to a

speech of Ensign Cilley at a dinner of the Bungtown Fencibles.--H.W.]

No. III